-
The first thing of which I
was aware when my mind slowly swept up from the
darkness of unconsciousness was an aching, racking
pain that seemed to permeate my entire body. The
pain localized itself slowly, and became a feeling
of heat on my back. I tried to move, and then
shivered and tensed myself as I felt water splashed
over me, lots of water, as though someone had doused
me with a whole bucketful.
-
-
After the first shock, the feel of the
water was gratifying, for it soothed for a moment
the burning sensation of heat. I moved an arm, to
turn over, and groaned as a pain shot through my
shoulder. I tried to open my eyes and look around -
- and failed. My eyes seemed glued hut. A feeling
of panic seized me. Where was I - - what happened
to me? I sat up in spite of the agony it cost me,
sat up and clawed at my face.
-
-
Something was covering my face,
something that was stringy and soppy and wet. I
tore it away in an excess of revulsion, and breathed
a gasp that was between a sigh of relief and a
laugh, as the light stabbed into my eyes. I blinked
several times to adjust my eyes to the light and
then glanced at the object in my hand which had
blinded me. It was a strand of seaweed, and this
strange fact led me to look around in wonder at my
surroundings.
-
-
I had been lying supinely in the sand,
on a broad beach. I was right at the shoreline, and
the water that I had felt dash over me had been,
without a doubt, an extra large wave. As near as I
could judge, the water had washed me up on this
shore, a short time before. On the shore, a few
yards from where I lay, the typical vegetation of a
tropical island shore began; while behind me
stretched the sea, its waves lit up to a copper
color by the red of the sun, which was low in the
west, off to my right. The heat from the sun was
still intense enough for me to realize that it was
it that had caused the heat on my back.
-
-
I sat for a little, dazed and puzzled.
My memory didn’t seem all that it should be. I
tried to call the mind the conditions that had
brought me to this pass, and tried in vain.
Strangely, not the faintest memory came to me of a
trip at sea. I had been born in an inland town and
had lived there all my life, and as far as memory
served, this was the first time that I had ever
looked upon the ocean.
-
-
I tried to think what had happened to me
lately. Vaguely, it seemed to me that I had
recently visited a friend of mine, a learned man - -
I recalled some sort of experiment in some obscure
branch of physical or psychological science - -
-
-
Adrian Channing! The name crashed into
my memory with a definite shock, bringing with it a
flood of recollection. This was the result of
Adrian Channing’s experiment. Channing had enlisted
me, only last night, to help him - - help him do
something - - and it had worked. It had worked and
I was - - well, more than likely I was someone else.
-
-
I was - - it was all coming back to me
now. Strange how my memory had been so hesitant to
reveal even my name, but a moment ago. I was - - or
rather, I had been - - Stephen Chalmers, student in
chemistry at the University of Southern Ohio. I had
been, when last I remembered, in Professor
Channing’s laboratory in his home in Cincinnati.
And I had agreed to become a sort of guinea pig for
one of the professor’s experiments.
-
-
I looked around, at the sea, the sand
and at the palms and ferns which formed the
background. It looked like Channing’s theory was
right. He had expected me to find things entirely
different on my awakening, and they certainly were
different. Certainly I wasn’t the Stephen Chalmers
whom I had always been.
-
-
I wondered just who I was. If
appearances counted for anything, I was a typical
shipwrecked mariner; for here was the sea, the
shore, the palms, and even, I noticed with a certain
degree of satisfaction, even numerous bits of
wreckage strewn along the shore.
-
-
I glanced down at myself to see if I was
dressed in sailor’s clothes or not and thereby got
another shock. I wore a sweater-like garment of
blue silk and a pair of yellow shorts of some kind
of rough wool. I wore sandals of green leather
laced halfway up my calf with bands of fine metal
mesh. I had a belt around my waist, a belt of the
same green leather that my sandals were made, nearly
six inches wide, with several pouches attached to
it, and a peculiar sort of snap on the left, as if a
scabbard of a holster were usually fastened there.
My hair was long, almost to my shoulders, and about
it was bound a tight turban.
-
-
The strangeness of this costume brought
to my lips an involuntary whistle. “Whew!” I
thought to myself. “I must be some sort of
foreigner.”
-
-
Strangely enough, this was a contingency
that had never occurred to me. All time, I had been
unconsciously considering that, after my strange
translation, I would at least still be an American.
But now, this new problem set me to reviewing again
the detail of the unprecedented experiment that had
brought me to this queer pass.
-
-
Channing, to state it briefly, had
devoted his life to the study of the nature of the
ego. But with a boldness that few, if any
psychologist or philosophers have ever had, he had
approached it from a perfectly material angle. To
his mind, the ego was an organ of the body, as much
as the brain or the heart is. He experimented for
years with the brains of animals, for he felt that
animals have individuality, as surely as humans, and
that it would be as easy to solve the mystery of
that individuality with such creatures as guinea
pigs and rabbits as it would with morons and
geniuses.
-
-
And when, after many years of study, he
had learned more than all the other philosophers of
history, he had come to me, asking me to be the
first human guinea pig.
-
-
“The ego, or soul, or psyche - - or call
it what you will,” he said to me, when he was trying
to explain what he wanted with me, “is a certain
pattern of atoms and molecules in the brain which is
largely determined by a series of vibrations. As
long as those molecules and atoms vibrate at a
certain frequency – you are you.
-
-
“But - - if it were possible to alter
that vibratory period; say, to exchange your
vibratory period with that of another man, the
entire ego, memories, habits and all, would be
exchanged at the same time!”
-
-
“And you want to change my vibratory
rate - - make me into somebody else?” I asked
uncertainly.
-
-
“Hardly that,” the scientist laughed.
“Although it may seem almost as strange. What I
intend to do is change your identity with someone
else who has a vibratory rate practically the same
as yours. Listen - - somewhere on earth, there’s
probably someone whose vibratory rate is the same as
yours or very nearly so. If you will submit to my
experiment, you will apparently change bodies with
this man. Of course I’ll be able to explain to him,
when he wakes up in your body. Then I’ll hold him
here until you return.
-
-
“And what I want you to do, when you
awake, is to return to me, as soon as possible, and
confirm the fact that the exchange has really taken
place. Then I’ll change you and this other fellow
back again, and I’ll consider my theory proven, and
give it to the world.”
-
-
It didn’t seem a very dangerous
experiment, the way he described it. And it would
certainly be an adventure par excellence.
I was to submit to hypnosis first and then go under
the influence of the machine which Channing had
built. If it didn’t work, Channing could wake me up
and I’d be none the worse for the attempt. If it
did work, I’d wake up as someone else, make my
way to Channing, and he would at once change me and
- - my affinity, I guess you’d call it, - - back
into our respective bodies. And that would be
that. It seemed to me that it might be a little
hard, a little puzzling to the other fellow, whoever
he might be, but I couldn’t see where it would hurt
me.
-
-
So I had agreed. And I had gone under
the influence of the machine, last night about
nine. And had awakened to this.
-
-
I glanced down again at the queer
clothes I wore. Of course, now that I stopped to
think of it, I might be almost anybody in the
world. There was nothing in Channing’s theory that
suggested that I had to be like the man I exchanged
with, physically. I might be almost anybody in the
world. I tried to think what sort or nationality I
might have, and found it a bit puzzling. Nobody in
North or South America was likely to be wearing a
turban, I thought. Turbans were usually associated
with Arabs or Bedouins. But, I realized at once,
Bedouins and Arabs weren’t usually associated with
the sea.
-
-
What kind of Mohammedans were
sailors? Malays? Lascars? It wasn’t likely that I
was one of those, for my skin appeared as white as
the skin I was used to. Whiter, I realized
suddenly.
-
-
Well, this brain-racking was getting me
nowhere. I began to realize that I was desperately
thirsty, and that the sun had set, and if I didn’t
find water before dark, I’d be lost thirstier
tomorrow. I decided to look about for some fresh
water.
-
-
I tried to rise to my feet, and was
brought quickly to the realization that this was not
the body of Stephen Chalmers, lying here in the
sand, but the body of some shipwrecked mariner. My
head began to spin, a dozen pains racked my joints,
and I all but fell over from weakness. I sat down
promptly and decided to reconnoiter a bit before
setting out to walk anywhere.
-
-
Probably the nearest source of water, I
reflected, would be among the trees back of the
beach. If I was shipwrecked, there had, most
likely, been a storm. And a storm means rain and
rain would most likely have left some puddles of
fresh water about. In fact, if I remembered
rightly, some palms and ferns have regular cups that
hold rainwater for some time.
-
-
So, in the gathering dusk, I crawled,
rather than walked, up to the line of vegetation. I
found, with practically no trouble, a small palm
with a central cup, filled with water just as I had
imagined it. I drank pretty deeply, and also
sampled a little yellow fruit that was growing on a
plant nearby. It tasted sweet, so I ate several
more. Then I sat down and allowed myself to doze,
and gradually I felt my strength begin to return to
me.
-
-
I roused myself several hours later. A
light had begun to shine annoyingly into my eyes,
and I noticed that the moon was rising, off to the
left. I stared at it drowsily for awhile, pondering
as I did on its small size. I had always heard that
the moon looked immense as it rose, in a tropical
country, but it certainly didn’t, here. I couldn’t
remember when I had seen the moon look so small. It
was almost as if it were a different orb, entirely.
-
-
I sat up suddenly, with a queer idea
setting the hair on my neck to prickling oddly. I
focused my eyes on the moon, trying in vain to make
out the contours that should have been familiar to
me. In spite of the wave of vertigo that seized me
as I stood up, I ran on the beach and, need back, I
looked about me.
-
-
To a very ignorant man, placed suddenly
in the position I was, the scene would have been one
of beauty and delight. The clear calm that follows
a storm had set a slow breeze blowing through the
palms, and the fragrance of tropical flowers came
from inland, borne on that breeze, to caress the
tops of the palms and to soothe the nostrils of
anyone who chanced to be near. The breeze was warm,
yet not too warm to be most comforting after the
heat of the day. A golden moon was rising over a
silver sea, and lighting up gloriously the long
sandy strand that stretched away for hundreds of
years in both directions. And in the velvet
darkness of the heavens, the stars shone like ten
thousand living pearls.
-
-
But, to me, in spite of its beauty, the
scene was one which was spine tingling in its
strangeness. For, in spite of its beauty, the moon
was too small. And the stars that glistened so
brilliantly were cold strangers to me, and they
stared down insolently at the lost stranger who
looked up at them.
-
-
For I am one who is not wholly ignorant
of the constellations. Once, like many other
people, I had made a hobby of learning the names of
the constellations and the chief stars, and I knew
them fairly well. Yet, in all that sky at which I
was then looking, not a single constellation,
indeed, as far as I could see, not a single star was
familiar to me!
-
-
For a moment, my spinning brain grasped
wildly at the thought that I was merely in the
southern hemisphere. But I could not fool myself
with that idea long. I knew maps of the southern
hemisphere too well to believe that such stars as I
was gazing at could be located there.
-
-
No, there could be no doubt about it - -
these stars were strangers to earth, to the solar
system, even. If those stars we’re real, if I could
accept that sky as fact, then there was no doubt
about one thing. I had exchanged egos with someone
who was an inhabitant of another planet, which swung
around another sun, untold light years away.
-
-
The realization of this calamity was too
much for my already seriously weakened condition. I
sank to the ground and a wave of merciful blackness
swept consciousness from me.
-
-
-
Chapter Two
-
-
The Pirates of Var-Hamek
-
-
-
I opened my eyes to consciousness for
the third time since I had taken residence in this
strange body. Someone was holding me, and pouring
something down my throat, something that had made me
cough and turn my head away. My head was promptly
seized and held while more of the stuff was poured
into my mouth. After a while I noticed that the
liquor warmed me strangely and gave me more strength
than I had felt since I had arrived at this
incredible place. I opened my eyes and looked
around.
-
-
The night had passed, apparently, while
I lay there unconscious, for it was day again and
the sun was shining through a rapidly dwindling
group of clouds. I was lying in the arms of a man,
a tall blond, muscular man, clad much as I was, save
that his clothing was older and of more garish
colors. His face was lean and angular, he had a
sharp hooked nose and high cheekbones, and a network
of fine wrinkles about his eyes and mouth showed
that he was a man just passing the prime of life.
He had a bottle in his hand, a bottle of
earthenware, and from this, he poured something into
my mouth, smiling encouragingly as he did so.
-
-
Standing over us, and apparently
directing proceedings was another man, a short,
black bearded fellow, with great shoulders and an
enormous chest, and with legs as bowed as an English
bulldog’s. He wore sweater and shorts, too, as I
did’ but he also wore a cloak, a great red cloak
that flung out in the shore wind like a comic book
hero’s. And, hanging by his side, was a curious ax,
a delicate, slim-bladed ax that looked about as much
like a battle-ax as a rapier looks like a
broadsword.
-
-
Behind him, half a dozen other men stood
looking over his shoulders. There were bearded men
and smooth; dark men with rings in their ears and
others as tall blond as the man that held me. They
muttered among themselves, quite obviously
commenting on me and on my probable identity. One
of them uttered what was probably a crude joke for
the others burst into laughter and answered him in
kind. When the cloaked one saw that I was
conscious, he addressed me.
-
-
“Ul-Zor-shareeb, varrain,” he
said. “Ku parathi hadar, in choth?”
-
-
Now this should have been quite
incomprehensible to me, of course. Yet that which
followed was only the first of several seemingly
miraculous things that occurred to me during the
next few weeks; that showed what a subtle and
perplexing thing the ego is. Just what part of our
intelligence lies in the physical body, and what in
the soul, no psychologist, not even Adrian
Channing, has attempted to state. One would feel
certain that the understanding of languages, for
instance, would be inherent in the soul’s memory and
would be transferred only with the soul’s transfer.
Yet, some fragment of the memory of that being who
had formerly occupied my body must have remained in
that body, for, clear and unmistakable, there formed
in my mind the meaning of the words which my rescuer
had uttered.
-
-
He had said: “The peace of Zor*, sailor.
How come you here upon the shore?”
-
-
My weakness was rapidly leaving me. I
reached for the bottle which the smiling blond
fellow still held, and took another swallow. I
strove to answer him.
-
-
I must have been shipwrecked,” I
answered. “Something has happened to my memory and
I don not know who I am.” I had settled on this
story almost at once as being the most credible and
the least likely to evoke questioning. I had no
sooner got it out of my mouth than I realized that I
had made the whole statement in English. Of course,
the leader of these men failed to understand it - -
he turned to his companions, saying, “He speaks a
strange tongue. Do any of you understand it?”
-
-
“One after another, they all shook their
heads. I was puzzled, myself. What strange quirk
of circumstance, what queer combination of spirit
and mind could account for the fact that while I
could understand the language as though it were my
native tongue, when I tried to speak, I only spoke
English? I can only say that, after much thought, I
have finally come to the conclusion that, while
hearing and understating is an involuntary act,
speaking is voluntary. And, somehow or other, the
ego which is transferred is somehow bound up with
the involuntary or subconscious mind.
-
-
Of course, I never thought of this at
the time. Then, I merely realize that I was
handicapped by the fact that I couldn’t speak the
language of these fellows; that I would have to
study in order to speak it, in spite of the fact
that even now, I could understand everything they
said.
-
-
Meanwhile, the captain was evidently
trying me out on different languages, of which he
apparently new not a few. He rattled off one
sentence after another in what, from their tone, I
could tell were the speeches of various sorts of
people. The man was quite a linguist, but, of
course, I could not understand a single one of the
other languages he spoke. He returned at last to
the original tongue in which he had first addressed
me.
-
-
“Apparently he is from some distant
unknown land,” he said disgustedly. He speaks none
of the languages of this part of the carid*.”
I don’t think he understands any languages I know.”
-
-
I seized upon the last sentence. It
seemed to offer certain possibilities.
-
-
“I - - I think I understand language you
know,” I said, slowly and hesitantly. I had managed
to piece these words together from the ones I had
heard in the last sentence. The captain looked at
me in some surprise. “He talks!” he exclaimed. “If
you can understand me, what are you trying to fool
me for?”
-
-
“I understand,” I answered, searching
for the words that might explain to him my
predicament. “I understand - - I no talk.”
-
-
The captain looked perplexed, and a
little irritated.
-
-
“By the beard of Zebantu, here’s
ignorance or a miracle,” he swore. “He understands
the language, but he can’t speak it. Yet he’s not
dumb, for he does speak it after a fashion. What do
you do, sailor? What is your trade?”
-
-
I reflected hurriedly. If I said I was
a sailor, I might be expected to work my way to
port. I had no fear of work, but the trade of a
sailor was something of which my ignorance was
profound. Better not dissemble, this time, I
thought.
-
-
“No sailor,” I managed to piece out.
The captain grinned and shrugged his shoulders.
-
-
“It makes little difference,” he said.
“I’ve all the sailors on the ship that I can use
anyhow. But I am shorthanded at the oars, and, by
his beard, you should row your way back to port,
were you a ghanvarrek*.
Bring him back to the galley, men. He’ll be able to
help us, I’m sure.”
-
-
He broke into a bellow of laughter, deep
bass laughter that rumbled out of the enormous chest
and went tumbling and rolling over the sand down to
the sea. It was an infectious laugh, and the others
all joined in it, and even I found myself smiling,
in spite of the fact that the joke, if joke there
was, was all on me.
-
-
The tall, blond fellow helped me to my
feet, and I found, to my satisfaction, that I was
able to walk, after a fashion. The men surrounded
me, and, with the captain leading, the led me along
the shore. We rounded a low hill, and there, not
far away, was a long, narrow, canoe-like boat
beached on the sand. And, standing off to sea, some
hundred yards or so from the shore, was the ship
that had brought these fellows here.
-
-
I was a galley of sorts, but no such
galley as I had ever seen or heard of. It was a
little over a hundred feet long; it had a high
poop-deck with a cabin below, and a single mast
whose square sail was now hauled to the yards. It
was painted a dull blue, and what little I could see
of the sail suggested that it was of a similar
color, as if there had been an attempt to lower the
visibility of the vessel as much as possible, by
giving it the color of the sea.
-
-
As soon as we made our appearance, a cry
rose up from the ship, which was immediately
answered by several of my companions. We approached
the long landing-boat, and two of the men climbed
into it and took their place at the oars. The squat
giant who was their leader sat down in a seat at the
end and ordered them to place me in front of him.
They did this, and the four of us were soon moving
out to the ship. The rest of the group calmly waded
out into the sea, clad just as they were, and
proceeded to swim out to the vessel alongside of us.
-
-
When we stepped upon the vessel’s deck,
(which, by the way, was a mere runway around the
gunwales above the oar deck below) the captain
addressed me for the first time since we had left
the shore.
-
-
“I am called Hupor of Intale,” he
informed me. “I am the ghanvarrek of this ship.
You will take orders from me or such officers as I
appoint to give them. You may have a day to
acquaint yourself with the ship and to get your
strength back; but at sunrise tomorrow, I expect you
to take your place at the oars.
-
-
“You look none too strong for a rower,
but a week or two at the oars will strengthen you.
Work hard, and you’ll find me an easy master - -
slacken and whine, and by the beard of Zebantu,
you’ll be lucky to ever see port. Keep your eyes
open and if you know naught of rowing now, see what
you learn by tomorrow!”
-
-
With these curt words, he turned away,
leaving me to wonder just what I ought to do next.
“A galley slave!” I was thinking. “Maybe that’s not
exactly my status, but it comes as close to it as
anything in my old life, that I ever heard of.”
-
-
My musings were interrupted by the tall
blond fellow who had held me and given me the drink,
on the shore. He clapped me on the shoulder and
there was a friendly twinkle in his eyes as he
spoke.
-
-
“It is strange,” he said, “that you can
understand us, and yet you cannot speak. But I have
seen stranger things. Once I knew a man who got a
blow on the head from an oar, and who couldn’t speak
for seven days. Yet he could write and tell us
whatever he would, in writing. Do you understand
what I say?”
-
-
I nodded. I groped for words. “I
understand what you say,” I said slowly. “Yet I
cannot say - -” I stumbled awkwardly, unable to go
farther. He grinned. “I will teach you words,” he
decided, suddenly. “I will say the words and you
shall repeat them after me.”
-
-
He started with himself. “I am Haliac,”
he announced. “And you? Do you remember your name?”
-
-
“Chalmers,” I said. He tried to repeat
it after me, but it seemed to be a little difficult
for him to pronounce. After several tries, he
managed to get out “Khamersis,” and this seemed as
close as he could come to it. I felt it made little
difference, anyhow, so “Khamersis” I became. He
introduced me to the other men on the ship as that,
and from then on I held that name.
-
-
But the language lesson did not end
then. Haliac began to point to various things and
call them by name. “Ghan,” he said, pointing
to the ship, and before he even attempted to tell me
what he meant, the word took meaning in my brain. “Var,”
he explained, and his arm swept out over the sea,
and the word was “sea” in my mind. It began to look
as if this language was going to be phenomenally
easy to learn, for with each word, an echo was
aroused, back in my mind, and it was as if the word
had merely been recalled to me out of temporary
forgetfulness.
-
-
It will hardly be necessary to recall
all of the incidents that occurred during the next
couple of weeks. My progress in the language was,
as I had expected, almost miraculous. My progress
as a rower was not so fast. For several days my
hands were swathed in rags, for the very first day
at the oars raised a crop of blisters that broke as
they grew and left my hands so sore and tender that
every pull at the oars was an agony. But Hupor kept
me at the oars, regardless, and even Haliac,
although he sympathized with my pain, agreed that
the best thing that could happen to me would be for
me to get my hands toughened as soon as possible.
-
-
I wondered often what sort of a person
the former wearer of my body had been. Of one thing
I was definitely certain - - he had not been a rower
on a galley. Yet, as time went on, I did get
toughened, just as the captain and Haliac had said.
And as my hands toughened, my muscles hardened, and
then, of course, the work began to seem easier.
-
-
I was fortunate in one thing - - Haliac
had been on an oar by himself, and had managed to
get me assigned to the same oar as he, the first
day. This boat had twenty oars, then to a side, and
two men were supposed to handle each of the oars.
They were a hard bitten, barbaric bunch, and I do
not doubt that I might have had a pretty hard time
of it, amongst them, had not this good-natured
fellow taken such a liking to me. And during those
first few days, he took much of my work from me,
when the mate wasn’t looking.
-
-
There was one thing that puzzled me,
about this ship. Twice or three times, during the
first week, the lookout whom they kept in the crow’s
nest had sighted other ships, and at once all
possible means were taken to avoid contact with the
distant vessel. It seemed strange to me that we
should flee, the moment we sighted the other ship,
and I said as much to Haliac, but for once he was
noncommittal, merely saying that I would probably
have it all explained to me when I could speak the
language better, and knew more of the customs.
-
-
I wracked my brain over these queer
actions, but I was only able to come to what I
thought was rather farfetched conclusion. It seemed
to me that it was possible that these fellows were
outlaws, pirates, perhaps; and that they were in
dangerous waters and forced to act with discretion
and caution. I did not really believe this to be
the truth, I merely adopted it as a probable
hypothesis. How right it was, subsequent events
were to show.
-
-
Hupor, the captain, was a rather kindly
man in his rough way, I found, and although we men
were often worked unmercifully hard, it was not he,
but the exigencies of the life, that drove us. When
the wind was up and in the right quarter, there was
little for the carsmen to do save keep things
shipshape, and then we often lay about for hours on
the deck in the sunlight, gambling for small stakes,
or talking or experiences on the sea and on the
land, resting and soaking up energy for the next
bout with the waves.
-
-
But when rowing was necessary, we rowed;
and we rowed until exhaustion claimed us and we
could row no more. Once we stayed at our oars for
ten hours at a stretch, and no words can describe
the utter agony of fatigue which I was in when at
last we ceased. But those days hardened me and gave
me a set of muscles that were to stand me in good
stead in the days to come.
-
-
Chapter Three
-
-
Battle
-
-
-
Still we sailed westward, and still we
avoided every other ship. Until one morning we
awoke (we had gone to sleep the night before with a
brisk wind in our sails), awoke to find ourselves in
a fog that made us close-haul our sails at once and
lie to until it cleared.
-
-
It must have been noon before it began
to break up. In a short time, a long lane had
cleared between the two fogbanks on the north and
the south of us, and suddenly, clear and plain,
three or four hundred yards to the west of us, we
spied a long sleek vessel, a vessel of low lines and
sturdy appearances that was a warship, if ever I saw
one.
-
-
I heard an oath from Hupor and almost
simultaneously our grizzled, one-eyed coxswain
Pharops, leaped to his feet with a cry of “To
oars!” We dropped from the runway where we had been
lounging, there was a wild scramble for a moment, as
each man strove to get to his own oar as quickly as
possible, and above the tumult I heard the anxious
cry of the captain: “Break out arms and prepare for
action!”
-
-
A moment later, he gave the command to
turn and flee to the east. Old Pharops took his
place at the drum, and began to beat out the cadence
of our stroke. He called an order, the port rowers
dipped their oars, and as we on the starboard side
hauled mightily on our own oars, the ship began to
turn. We were fleeing the warship within two
minutes after sighting it.
-
-
But to avoid a ship several miles
distant, and to escape from one which appears
suddenly almost on your bow, are two different
things. We did, indeed, gain some way by our quick
action, we were, in fact, nearly a half mile off by
the time the enemy turned, but, once turned, she
rapidly bore down on us, and ere fifteen minutes had
passed, it was evident that she was going to
overhaul us.
-
-
There were five sailors attached to our
vessel, fellows who attended to the sail and
considered themselves above the rowers. These
fellows and the four officers were called up on the
poop-deck and arms and armor were distributed to
them. When Hupor saw that the ship was surely going
to be overtaken, he called out to about five of the
oarsmen and armed them, too. Haliac was one of
these, and for the first time since I had come upon
the ship, I found that it was going to be necessary
to handle our oar alone. Haliac patted my back as
he left me and grinned reassuringly.
-
-
“Don’t get rattled, now,” he said, in
effect. “You know what to do by now, and all you
need is confidence in yourself. Just forget I’m not
here and you’ll handle that oar as well as if I were
with you.”
-
-
He jumped up to the runway as he spoke,
precluding any chance I might have had to ask him
questions. And then I was so busy holding the oar
that I had no time to even think of questions.
-
-
The warship was either a far better
vessel than ours or it was handled far better than
our own. It bore down on us, and from where I was,
I could look out of the oar port and watch its
maneuvers easily. It was broadside to us when I
first looked, and for awhile I was puzzled at what
it was attempting to do. It could, I felt sure,
have easily overhauled us, yet it seemed to be
attempting to get on our tail and come up behind us.
-
-
I couldn’t imagine what advantage this
maneuver would have until the ship had practically
completed it. Then some vague fragment of
half-forgotten Greek history leaped suddenly into my
mind; and I remembered - - somewhere I had read of
one vessel crashing into another and shattering the
oars, coming up alongside to boar and fight hand to
hand - -
-
-
From Pharops the coxswain came a sudden
panic-laden cry of “All starboard rowers awa-ay!”
The men about me were leaping from their; I dropped
my oars and sprang up, caught a ledge of the runway
and drew myself to the upper deck - - not a minute
too soon.
-
-
I heard a great crackling and snapping
of breaking oars, hear an agonized shriek and a cry
of angry agony, and knew that not all the rowers had
been as lucky as I. I heard Hupor shouting some
order something about standing by to repel boarders,
but his voice was almost drowned in the tumult of
dozens of war-cries from the enemy vessel and
stentorian shout of “Stand by to board!”
-
-
For a moment, real panic gripped me. I
was unarmed and unprotected, I was on the side of
the vessel where the enemy were sure to reach me,
the moment they boarded. I looked about me wildly,
wondering where I would be safe. Old Pharops had
left his drum immediately after his last cry and was
now on the poop-deck, arming himself. He turned to
the oar deck now, to cry, “All ye rowers who can
fight, come up here and arm yourselves!” I
hesitated but a moment, and then rushed forward
without about a dozen others.
-
-
We were each handed a small round shield
and one of the curiously delicate axes such as the
captain wore. These axes, I had learned, were
called lecs*; they were a development of the ancient
battle ax, in much the same way as the rapier is a
development of the ancient war-sword. These people
have developed a technique with these weapons, a
technique as elaborate as our own dueling, and
dangerous, indeed, is a lec in the hands of an
expert, in spite of its delicate appearance.
Incidentally, the use of the lec is almost
universal, and in all the time I was in this world,
I never saw use of a sword of any kind.
-
-
Bu there was little time to consider the
type of weapon I was to protect myself with. I
seized the lec, and especially the shield, and my
main feeling was one of gratitude that I was not to
be totally unprotected if I had to face one of the
enemy. I balance the lec in my hand, swung it a
time or two and gave it a twist to see how it acted
in combat.
-
-
To my surprise, old Pharops, who was
standing by me, grunted approvingly. “A clever
twist, Khamersis,” he said. “Where learned ye that
one?”
-
-
I made no answer. I was experiencing a
feeling of surprise. With every cut through the
air, a confidence was coming to me, a feeling that
with this weapon I should be - - no, that I was - -
a master. For some reason or another, here was
another thing that my body had clung to when it
exchanged masters - - the knowledge of the use of
the lec.
-
-
And so, with that conviction that I
could handle myself satisfactorily, I hesitated no
longer. I leaped from the poop deck to the runway
and hurled myself on the invading enemy.
-
-
The poop deck, as I have mentioned
before, was merely the roof of a cabin, raised on
the forward part of the boat. I leaped off of it
and rushed along the runway to where the first of
the invaders were fighting. One fellow whom I
singled out was dressed, I noticed, in a suit of
dark blue trimmed in red, and a glanced showed me
that most of the others wore uniforms of this type,
too. They seemed to be armored lightly - - helmet,
breastplate and greaves being the main articles of
their armor, and they fought with shields and lecs,
as did we.
-
-
It seemed obvious from this that the
invaders were sailors of some navy, and, more than
ever, it began to look as if my lot had been cast
with a shipload of outlaws. I hesitated a bit at
this thought, but, a moment later, came the
realization that these men were really the only
friends I had in the world.
-
-
And, I reflected, it might be months
that I would be castaway on this distant world while
Channing awaited by return in another body. Not
until he had given up all hope of seeing me again
would he decide finally to utilize his machine to
restore me to my rightful body. And until that
time, I was marooned on this barbaric, unfriendly
planet, and it behooved me, it seemed, to cling to
such friends as I had found.
-
-
So I threw myself on the nearest enemy
and, in little more than a minute of fight, had the
satisfaction of piercing his helmet with the pointed
tip of my lec. He had no more than fallen when I
heard a desperate cry of “To me Khamersis!” It was
Haliac’s voice, and, turning about, I saw him, on
the opposite runway, striving desperately to hold
off three of the uniformed invaders.
-
-
I took a couple of running steps and a
huge leap, which took me clear across the open well
of the oar-deck and landed me but a few paces from
Haliac, on the other side. My lec flashed out as I
landed, like a woodpecker’s bill. It caught one of
the enemies just between the eyes, before he ever
knew I was in the fight; and almost before he had
started to fall, I had disengaged my weapon and
turned on another of the foe.
-
-
The third one had his hands full
fighting Haliac, and now that things were a little
more even, I devoted my entire time to my single
enemy, figuring that Haliac could certainly take
care of his own opponent.
-
-
The man that I had engaged was
apparently an officer of fairly high rank, for his
dark blue uniform wore a huge silver globe
embroidered on the chest. And he was no slough with
the lec, either, as I realized after less than a
moment of feinting and parrying. I beat him back a
few paces at first, for he evidently had underrated
my skill, and expected to have a fairly easy time
with me. But when he realized that the man that
face him was no ordinary ignorant seaman, but a
master of the weapon he held, his defense tightened
up and, indeed, he managed to put up a fairly good
offensive.
-
-
It was several minutes before he began
to yield. And it was not until a terrific assault
of his had failed before I was able to take a step
toward him. Once he took that first backward step,
I knew that I was his master, for the deck was
crowded and slippery, and it would be but a matter
of time, I knew, until I cornered him somewhere, and
then, unable to move farther, he would have to face
everything I gave. And I felt confident that I
could give enough to end his interest in the
proceedings.
-
-
It turned out just about as I expected.
My opponent had been facing me, with his back to the
forward end of the ship. He retreated step by step
to that part of the deck that held the little
balcony which ran around the cabin. In a few
minutes he stood with his back to the cabin, his
face white with desperation. I knew well that I was
absolute master of him, now; and he knew it, too.
Another minute of lasing, flashing lec-work and the
blade of my weapon suddenly came down, swift and
unopposed, on his helmet, cleaving it neatly and
burying itself in the bone beneath. He gave a
bubbling, choked-off cry, and fell to the deck,
slipped a bit and rolled over the edge to the
oar-deck below.
-
-
I heard a sudden roar of cheering behind
me and turned about in surprise. The balcony on
which I stood was quite clear of either enemies or
allies. Some twenty feet down the runways, Haliac
and half a dozen others held the enemy at bay, an
enemy that, apparently, had attempted little to aid
their officer, for they were standing with their
weapons at guard, and both sides had been watching
the outcome of my personal battle.
-
-
I thought of battles of which I had read
in the barbaric past of my own world, when the
entire struggle often ceased, while the men of both
sides gathered round tow champions and watched them
fight to the death. Was it possible that that was
the meaning of the attitudes of the men at this
moment? I was not long left in doubt, for, seeing
my opponent conquered, my friends burst into cheers
as though at a signal, and hurled themselves
joyously on their opponents again. Once more the
battle joined.
-
-
I stood for a moment, breathing deeply,
for the intense action of my bout had left me
winded. I don’t suppose I stood there longer than
it would take to count ten, yet that brief rest
almost proved my undoing. A band of five soldiers
from the warship had, unnoticed by the rest of us,
retreated to their ship, hurried forward and boarded
our ship again, on the poop-deck. Their intention
was to rescue their officer, but they arrived too
late for that, of course. Yet they undoubtedly felt
that there was still time to avenge him, for now
with one accord, all five of them leaped from the
poop-deck and rushed at me.
-
-
I heard a cry of warning from my own
comrades, and my lec and shield flew up to the guard
almost involuntarily. The first fellow to reach me
fell before any of his comrades could arrive to aid
him. I engaged a second one, and a backward sweep
of my lec caught him n the thigh before he had even
a chance to face me. He was injured, but not
sufficiently to put him out of the combat, so I
found myself face to face with four of the enemy and
with all my comrades busily engaged, a good dozen
paces away.
-
-
If I have boasted some of my prowess
with lec and shield, I hope I have not given you the
feeling that I considered myself invulnerable.
Four, I knew well, were just a little to many, even
for one who had inherited such ability as mine. Yet
I could see no alternative to fighting, so I backed
closer to the wall, resolved to do my best as long
as I could, and to go down fighting, if necessary.
-
-
I backed another step, and another - -
-
-
It suddenly dawned on me that I was
backing through the door of the cabin. Someone had
opened it; I felt a hand on my arm, pulling me
through! I stepped back once more, the heavy oaken
door slammed shut, I heard the bar fall and turned
around to thank my unseen rescuer.
-
-
Standing before me in the dingy cabin,
in a nimbus of blue silk garments and billowing
golden hair, was the most beautiful girl that I had
ever seen in my life.
-
-
Chapter Four
-
-
Kayana of Mizmar
-
-
-
The reader can well imagine
that I was at a loss for words, I tried to mumble
some sort of thanks, but it was useless. The new
found language tied up my tongue and made me stammer
like a schoolboy. And, because of this lack of
self-possession, I felt my face getting red and
realized that this only made my appearance all the
more ridiculous.
-
-
I sputtered there for a dozen seconds,
while a smile crept over the lady’s face and lighted
it up even more than the golden curls did. I
clapped my gaping mouth shut, stood for a second
gaining control of myself, and then said, “I thank
you, my lady, for your timely rescue. I fear I was
hard put to it, facing four enemies.”
-
-
“Indeed, I thought as much, too,” she
answered with a queer stiffness. “And I have few
enough protectors as it is. It would have been a
foolish thing not to save one who fights so well in
my behalf.”
-
-
I looked at her curiously. So I had
been fighting in her behalf, and I? There was
certainly more on this ship than met the eye at
first glance. Or at second, either.
-
-
“I must say, in all honesty, that I
didn’t know that I was fighting in your behalf,
lady,” I told her, “I fought, to be frank, merely
because the ship was attacked, and I saw no way of
saving my own hide, save by saving the ship.”
-
-
She froze up instantly.
-
-
“If you fell so,” she said haughtily.
“There is the door and there are you enemies.” She
glanced out a little porthole. “The way beyond the
door seems clear now. Go out and finish saving your
hide.”
-
-
“It was through no fault of mine that I
did not fight for you, madam,” I said, hotly. “How
could I fight for one of whom I didn’t even know the
existence? For two weeks, I have been on this ship,
and in all that time, not one word had been said of
the presence of a woman. And yet you expect that I
should fight for you.”
-
-
“Two weeks?” she repeated wonderingly.
“Why, then, you are - - you are the shipwrecked one
of whom Hupor told me?”
-
-
I was about to answer when the door
opened and Hupor, himself, walked in. He bore
unmistakably the marks of battle, a dented helmet
was sitting all awry on his head; a great bruise on
the side of his face was rapidly blackening his eye
and there was an ugly scratch nearly six inches long
on his right biceps. But there was a huge grin on
his face, too, and his lec was red with blood.
-
-
“We have them, lady,” the ghanvarrek
announced boisterously, “We drove them back to their
ship, followed them and took over.” He saw me, his
eyebrows raised, the smile dropped from his face - -
and instantly appeared again.
-
-
“It seems that you have met our hero,
already,” he remarked. “It was of his deeds that I
came to boast, but it seems that he has anticipated
me.”
-
-
The girl shook her head.
-
-
“He has told me nothing of his deeds,”
she answered. “Save that he performed them to save
his own hide, and not to help Mizmar.”
-
-
Hupor burst into a roar of laughter,
then silenced it, immediately.
-
-
“I ask pardon, radiant one,” he said
humbly. “But I fear he speaks naught but the truth.
This is the shipwrecked one of whom I told you. He
is, I think, under some strange spell, for when we
found him, he knew naught of himself, nor could he
speak our language, though, strangely, he understood
it. You can readily see that I couldn’t trust him
much, for such a strange story might well be told by
a spy. So I have kept him in ignorance of your
presence, and I doubt not but that he was mightily
surprised when he first beheld you.”
-
-
“And now, if he is a spy, the mischief
is done, eh, master?”
-
-
Hupor shook his head. “I’ll swear not
that he’s no spy, lady. Taws he who slew the
ghanvarrek of the Trepsis, and so made
possible our victory just now. If it is so that the
spies sent against us act, may Kalsus send us a
thousand more. There was little stomach left for
fight in those fellows when they saw their captain
slain by one who wore the garments of a common
oarsman. And, by the way,” he went on, I ordered
their oars taken from them, ere we set them loose.
This will not only equip us again, but it will leave
them at the mercy of the winds and this mist.”
-
-
While ghanvarrek had been speaking, the
lady had been looking at me quizzically. “It occurs
to me, Hupor,” she said when he had finished. “It
occurs to me that if this man is no spy of Kalsus,
if you feel sure of his loyalty, that it might be
well to tell him all. The slayer of a naval captain
is no mean warrior and should certainly be one of
us. Why, he may be a nobleman or one of royal
blood. Certainly he fights like one who had been
taught by a master. A place at the oars is no place
for him.”
-
-
Hupor nodded affirmatively and, taking
me by the shoulder, led me toward the door. “Right
glad I’ll be to make him one of us, lady,” he
assured her. “We need every lec we can find, and
this one is no mean weapon.”
-
-
We bowed our farewells, and Hupor led me
outside and up on the poop deck. Hupor went and
leaned against the rail and I followed his example.
For a while we stood in silence, for I was waiting
for him to speak and he seemed to be at a loss just
what to say.
-
-
“It is hard to know just where to start,
in speaking to a man who rests under a spell of
forgetfulness,” he began. He reflected a moment
then asked, “Do you remember anything of the part of
the world you are in?”
-
-
I assured him that I was quite ignorant
of the geography of any part of the world.
“Perhaps, then, ‘twould be best to inform you of
where you are. Heard you ever of the lands of
Mizmar, Tindar or Phend?”
-
-
I shook my head. “The names mean
nothing to me,” I said, “although I have heard them
used once or twice by the men.”
-
-
“Well,” said Hupor. “This sea that we
sail is the Var-Hamek, and the three lands of which
I spoke surround its western end. On its northern
shores, south of the great mountains, lies Phend, a
land of fair-haired people, ruled over by a king
called Renthapes. ON the south, the ocean is
bounded by Mizmar, in the east and Tindar in the
west. Most of the people of Mizmar and Tindar are
dark-haired, though the ruling houses are blond,
having come down from the north, many generations
ago.
-
-
“Of Mizmar as I, and most of my men.
And of Mizmar is the Lady Kayana, whom you met in
the cabin.”
-
-
“She gave me the impression of being a
very proud and very noble lady,” I said, in an
effort to be gallant and at the same time show that
I considered her actions just a little too proud.
“I think it very strange that she should be on this
ship. I doubt if you can imagine my surprise when I
saw her in the cabin.”
-
-
Hupor let a smile flit across his face.
-
-
“Your amazement was no greater than mine
was, when she first boarded this ship,” he told me.
“For Kayana is a great lady, indeed. She is none
other than uncrowned Queen of Mizmar.”
-
-
My perplexity grew greater than ever.
-
-
“It seems to me, Hupor, that I have
either greatly misjudged you or there is need for
much explanation. From certain things I have heard,
I had gathered that you and your crew were little
more than a gang of pirates.”
-
-
He chuckled. “No more we are,” he
answered, frankly. “Had you told me, two months
ago, that this ship would become the dwelling place
of royalty, I’d have laughed in your face. But, by
the beard of Zebantu, I am Mizmar-born, and I’ll be
loyal to Mizmar’s house till I descend to Ephar*.
“Twas thus it came about, Khamersis, that I
entertain the Lady Kayana on this ship.”
-
-
He hesitated a minute, planning how he
might present the story. Then he started off.
-
-
“Some three months ago, the King of
Mizmar, the Lady Kayana’s father, died. It was a
sudden mysterious malady, which the doctors could
make nothing of, and it was rendered still more
mysterious by the death, only three days after, of
his most trusted adviser. The Kiphoram, the
congress of nobles, was called at once, and his
eldest daughter was given the throne in the absence
of any sons. This was a mere formality, of course,
for there was no one else to whom the throne could
rightfully be offered. But, unfortunately, the
Kiphoram also made a ruling, giving the vacant post
of chancellor, or chief adviser, to Kalsus, the son
of the dead adviser.”
-
-
I smiled and shook my head. “Very bad,”
I said. “I smell something rotten already. I
strongly suspect that the deaths of the king and the
adviser were due to some subtle poison. Am I
right?”
-
-
“By the beard of Zebantu, there are many
in the city who thinks so,” swore Hupor, feelingly.
“But none dared to say what they thought for Kalsus
had great power and none had profited from the
deaths but him. And if a man had said, ‘These
deaths were murder,’ cold Kalsus might have said,
‘Are you accusing me?’ and that would have been the
end of that man.”
-
-
He spat over the rail and shook his head
as if in disapproval of the whole thing.
-
-
“Of course, we common people know
nothing of the intricacies of intrigue among the
royal one. If I had been in the Lady’s place, I’d
have strung up Kalsus first, and asked questions
after. But no, here was Kalsus, a parricide if
there ever was one, and holding a position of power
in the court of the lady whose father he had
undoubtedly killed.
-
-
“And, as if that weren’t enough, it soon
became evident that he was a vile traitor to his
country, too. For he had taken the pay of
Renthapes, the king of Phend, and had offered to
make the arrangements for the marriage of the Lady
to this same Renthapes and thus unite the two
kingdoms under the scepter of the Phendine king!”
-
-
I whistled. “Rather a high-handed way
to do things, wasn’t it?” I asked. “Wasn’t the Lady
to have anything to say about it, at all?”
-
-
“Well, actually, her word is final. But
you must remember here were many things, affairs of
statecraft and so forth that led her to temporize
before she gave her final word of denial. Yet, at
the last, she refused definitely, and commanded that
Kalsus send the denial to the Phendine king.
-
-
“Twas then that Kalsus showed his hand.
As chancellor, he had absolute control of the army,
and he used that control t rebel. In a single
night, he captured Mizrend, the capital city, from
the few palace guards that remained loyal to Kayana,
and all but captured Kayana, too.”
-
-
“But where do you fit into all this
picture, Hupor?”
-
-
“Ah, that’s just what I’m coming to. It
happened that my ship was lying at the docks of
Mizrend, disguised as an innocent merchantman of
Tindar. Now how it came to be known to him, I know
not, but there came to me Luplar, the high-priest of
Zor, bringing with him one whom I thought to be a
young boy, but who turned out to be our Lady,
herself. And truly, this Luplar must have read my
heart from afar, by some strange means, for he
brought her to me, whom he knew to be a pirate, in
preference to any other ghanvarrek on the docks.
-
-
“He told me who she was, and told me to
take her and flee, to make sure she was not captured
and to await news from him when he had prepared a
place for her, in the mountains. And there,
Khamersis, you have all the main details of the
intrigue, as well as I know them, up to now.”
-
-
I breathed a sigh. “Had I known all
this before, Hupor, I might have fought a little
more bravely in the service of the Lady.”
-
-
“But I knew nothing of you, Khamersis,”
he said, defensively. “You told me nothing of your
prowess as a warrior. You claimed to be unable to
speak our language, yet you learned it with
suspicious ease. I know absolutely nothing of where
you came from or what you had been. Oh, there is
much to make me wonder, even now.”
-
-
I thought for a moment. This Hupor was
probably as intelligent a man as I was likely to
meet during my sojourn on this barbaric world. He
was a leader of these men with whom I had cast my
lot. And if there was any man that I might call
friend, it was he. I determined to tell him the
truth, and see how he took it.
-
-
So, to Hupor, standing there on the poop
deck and gazing off into the still clearing fog, I
told of Adrian Channing and of his transfer of my
ego into this other body which I now wore. And as I
spoke, I watched carefully, yet not once did I see
incredulity come into his face.
-
-
“It seems a powerful magic, indeed, that
the wizards of your world wield,” he said, when I
had finished. “But it causes me to wonder much
concerning one thing. And I wonder that you haven’t
wondered it, too.”
-
-
“What’s that,” I asked, idly.
-
-
“Why, just who wore this body before you
so curiously deprived him of it. Have you never
thought of that?”
-
-
“I don’t suppose I have, very much.
Whoever he was, he’s undoubtedly having as
interesting adventure as I, back there on my own
world.”
-
-
Hupor grinned a little sinisterly,” I
don’t know whether I’d want to live in such a world
as that or not,” he said. “But this I do know - -
from this moment forth, you row no more. You are
too valuable a man, with your strange wisdom and
your skill with the lec. From now on, I call you
brother, and from now on, you act as the Lady
Kayana’s personal guard.”
-
-
He held out a hand to me and I clasped
it firmly. For a moment we stood there motionless,
then his eyes, looking beyond me, caught sight of
something and he dropped my hand like a hot potato.
-
-
“To oars,” he bellowed. “Stand by your
oars!”
-
-
At the same moment, there came a call
from the watcher in the crow’s nest: “Fleet of
vessels tow points off the starboard stern.”
-
-
Hupor broke into a string of
incomprehensible oaths and dashed to the cabin deck,
closely followed by myself. As I ran, I looked off
to the rear to see what had caused all the
excitement. Less than a mile away lay at least six
vessels, much like the one we had recently engage,
and all of them were flying the colors of the
country of Mizmar!
-
-
Chapter Five
-
-
The Chinar-ul-Hamek
-
-
-
It was obvious enough what had
happened. In the fog, our ship had drawn close to
the very fleet we had been trying so hard to avoid,
and the ship which we had recently encountered and
fought with had probably been one of the scouting
cruisers on the southern end of the fleet. More
than likely, the sailors of that ship had already
been rescued from their carless vessel, and the
entire fleet was probably looking for us by now.
-
-
During the battle, we had sailed
westward, and now we were on the southwest of the
fleet. I recalled the Hupor had been sailing west
for the last few days, and it seemed to me that we
had one advantage, at least. We had managed to sail
around the fleet lying in wait for us, and were now
fleeing in the direction in which our captain wanted
to go.
-
-
Hupor had hurriedly run to the stern and
taken his place at Pharops’ drum, and before the old
odvarrek reached his position, the captain was
already setting the cadence for the oars, and
building it up to greater speed with every stroke.
I glanced down the line of rowers and saw Haliac,
muscles straining and veins standing out on his
forehead like cords. Hey was trying to handle our
oar alone, and was succeeding fairly well, in spite
of the killing pace that Hupor was setting.
-
-
I dropped to the oar deck, made my way
to him and tried to seat myself in my old place
beside him.
-
-
“Nay, Khamersis,” he said. “You are a
warrior, now, I hear. This is no place for you, any
longer. I can handle this oar alone now.”
-
-
“Nonsense,” I snorted. “This is no time
for quibbling. This is a matter of life and death.
Every hand that can hold an oar is needed now, lest
the Lady Kayana find herself in the hands of her
enemies.”
-
-
He flashed me a look of gratitude, and
moved over to allow me a place beside him. Hupor
had watched me a little quizzically, as I took my
seat, and had evidently overheard what I said. Now,
turning over the drum to Pharops, he turned to the
four sailors, who stood chatting near the mast and
roared with sudden violence:
-
-
“Khamersis is right! Here’s no place
for idlers now. Bear a hand on the oars there, ye
bloated aristocrats.”
-
-
The four looked at him with hurt,
indignant looks in their eyes, as though they had
suffered the ultimate indignity. Like most skilled
laborers in whatever world, they looked on it as
beneath them to toil at common labor. But they did
not disobey. They silently took their places at the
oars which had a single rower, and from then on, the
entire crew worked.
-
-
And the work of the entire crew was
needed, too. The calm which had come with the fog
made sails entirely useless, and the men of the
Mizmaran fleet were splendidly disciplined; so it
was all we could do to keep the ships from
overhauling us at once. By what were almost
superhuman efforts on our part, we did manage to do
that. It was a trying business, though, and as the
minutes changed to hours and the numbers of hours
climbed from three to four and from four to five,
the strain began to tell on all of us.
-
-
It was late afternoon, now. Hupor stood
on the poop deck and gazed off anxiously into the
west. The setting sun dazzled his eyes, and I could
see him turn, ever and anon, to look back with
concern at the distant ships, which hung inexorably
on our tail.
-
-
“He hopes the sun may blind them,”
Haliac said to me. “With the sun in their eyes, we
might, with luck, escape them. Or, at least, we
might get far enough away to escape under cover of
darkness, later on. I fear there is little hope of
that, though. There are too many of them, and they
will spread out when darkness comes.”
-
-
“Has Hupor a goal in mind?” I asked.”I
notice he has been sailing west ever since I came on
the ship.”
-
-
Haliac gave a snorting laugh.
-
-
“If I know anything of the sea, we
passed that goal hours ago,” he stated. “It was
Hupor’s intention to lie to in some little known
cove on the coast of Tindar, until Luplar, the high
priest, could prepare a place for Kayana. But
Tindar is nearly to the southeast of us now. We
draw near to the Chinar-ul-Hamek, and what we’ll do
then, I know not.”
-
-
“Chinar-ul-Hamek?” I said. “That’s a
name I haven’t heard before. What new kind of
obstacle is that, Haliac?”
-
-
He looked at me in wonder. “Surely the
spell of forgetfulness that possesses you is a
powerful one, Khamersis, when it even makes you
forget the Chinar-Ar,” he answered. “Yet, if you
truly have forgotten it, listen, friend. This sea
of ours, the Var-Hamek, opens into another sea, an
ocean that is as much greater than the Var-Hamek as
is the Var-Hamek greater than a puddle of water.
That great sea is the Var-ul-Carid, the ‘sea of the
world’, and no man has ever seen the other side.
-
-
“And where the Var-Hamek empties into
the Var-ul-Carid, it pours its waters through the
narrow canyon of the Chinar-ul-Hamek, the gate of
Hamek, and there the waters rush eternally through
the pass…”
-
-
He stopped, for from the lookout had
come a cry of “la-and-oh!”
-
-
“I think there will be little need to
describe the Chinar-Ar,” Haliac finished. “More
than likely, you will look upon it, yourself, ere,
many hours pass.”
-
-
I heard Hupor swearing; there came a
command from Pharops and we of the starboard side
dipped oars for a moment while the ship swung to the
south. Hupor shook an angry fist at the distant
fleet and swore again.
-
-
“Had we but been a few hours later, I
might have made this turn under cover of darkness
and deceived them,” he cried to the men. As it is,
I’m afraid we’ll be forced to fight before very
long.
-
-
We bent wearily to the oars again, our
fatigue overcome only by our desperation. And the
sun sank slowly below the horizon, and night
gradually came, and the constellations which seemed
so strange to me came out one star at a time, and
still we struggle on.
-
-
Hupor went into the cabin of Kayana and
was there some time. Evidently they were discussing
our predicament, and trying to decide what to do.
Pharops called one of the rowers and they prepared a
supper of sorts and served us as we rowed. They did
it in the dark, of course, for no lights could be
allowed on the ship.
-
-
At last Hupor opened the door of the
cabin and called to me. Rather surprised, I
relinquished the oar to Haliac and rose, making my
way to the cabin. The ghanvarrek motioned me to
enter and after I had done so:
-
-
“Khamersis,” he said. “I have informed
the Lady Kayana of what you told me, concerning your
origin. And she had agreed with me that it would be
best if you had a voice in this council, for it
might be that your strange wisdom would perceive a
method of escape from the fleet that we cannot see.
Here are the facts of our position.”
-
-
He stepped across to a table, a table
beside which the Lady Kayana sat, and on which stood
a small oil lamp and a great sheet of some
parchment-like substance lay, on which appeared the
outlines of a map.*
-
-
I had already heard enough about the
countries of this part of the carid to
realize that I was looking at a map of them. Very
roughly, the lands seemed to resemble Spain and the
northern part of Africa, with the straits of
Gibraltar and the western end of the Mediterranean.
What would have been Spain was labeled Phend, and
what would have been the Straits was marked
“Chinar-ul-Hamek.”
-
-
“Our position, at present, is here,”
said Hupor, and pointed to a spot a few miles north
of the Chinar. “If we continue to follow the coast,
as we must, they will trap us, sooner or later.
Even if they don’t, sooner or later we’ll round the
coast all the way to Mizmar, and there we’ll be
easily captured. The only salvation I can see is to
run the gauntlet of the fleet under cover of
darkness.”
-
-
“My first suggestion would be - - why
not sail out into the Var-ul-carid,” I told him,
after examining the map a little more carefully.
Surely we could lose them in that vast ocean.”
-
-
Hupor laughed shortly.
-
-
“Truly you are a man of another world,
Khamersis,” he said. “None make the attempt to sail
out into the Var-ul-carid. In the first place, the
current from the Var-Hamek is so great that it
almost precludes hope of returning. And the tale of
monsters and mysteries that inhabit that endless
ocean are legion. None that have braved the horrors
of that uncharted vastness have ever returned to
tell of it.”
-
-
I smiled a little at this.
-
-
“Don’t you think you are worrying a
little too much over the details of dangers in a
spot from which no one has ever returned, Hupor. If
no one has over returned, whence came the tales of
the dangers?
-
-
Hupor looked at me with a peculiar look
on his face. I hastened to follow up the idea that
had come to me.
-
-
“I would suggest that we sail through
the Chinar, and then sail to the south. We could
land on the coast of Tindar, the western coast, here
- -” and I placed my finger on the map, “ - - and
from there we could make our way overland, to Mizmar
and its coast.”
-
-
Hupor looked dubiously at Kayana. “It
might be possible,” she said, slowly. “If we kept
well to the south while in Tindar, we might manage
it.”
-
-
I persisted in my plan.
-
-
“Once, Hupor,” I said. “There was a Sea
of Darkness in my own world, even as there is,
here. For generations, men feared to sail it, yet
when they finally braved its imaginary horrors, they
found, on its farther shores, the fairest and
richest land in all the earth. And it might well
be, that beyond the Chinar-Ar lies, not only safety,
but fortune.”
-
-
Hupor was not entirely convinced, but
Kayana settled it by saying: “I think he seeks
wisdom, ghanvarrek. At least we can sail through
the Chinar, and see if our pursuers follow.”
-
-
Hupor was not unwilling to have the
initiative, taken from him, I could see. He
shrugged his shoulders and smiled.
-
-
“It shall be as you say, lady,” he
promised. “We could hardly find things worse for us
in the Var-ul-Carid than they are right here and
now.”
-
-
He bowed, then turned and left the
cabin. I stood for a moment, awkward in the
presence of the Mizmari princess, then I bowed, too,
silently, and turned about to leave.
-
-
“Your attention for a moment,
Khamersis,” I heard Kayana say, softly. I spun
about again and bowed before her.
-
-
“Our initial meeting was none too
propitious,” she began with a smile. “I fear your
manners before royalty need improvement.”
-
-
I felt a wave of angry resentment begin
to rise within me. I had belittle myself a couple
of times before this girl simply because I had felt
that when in Rome one must do as the Romans do. I
had bowed and scraped to the best of my ability - -
and this was the result. My manners, forsooth,
needed improvement.
-
-
“I doubt not, lady, that my attempts at
humility are crude. Would it interest you to know
that in all my life, I never before bowed before any
man or woman?”
-
-
She looked at me with a sudden added
interest. “If you are of another world, as Hupor
tells me you told him, you must be a great lord in
that other world, Khamersis. How else could you
have avoided bowing before your superiors?”
-
-
“We do not believe in servility and
elaborate sycophancy in my land,” I explained. “We
feel that with the right amount of sincerity and
decent politeness, all that ceremony is
unnecessary.”
-
-
She thought on this for a moment, then:
“The idea seems all very well,” she said. “But I
cannot see what advantage there would be, to be of
nobility, in a land where the nobility is ignored.”
-
-
“That’s just what I’m getting at. In my
home land there is no nobility to bow down to. Or
rather - - one man is just as noble as another.”
-
-
She couldn’t see it, of course. She
said, quite simply, “But one man is not as
noble as another, no matter what you say.”
-
-
I tried to explain. She couldn’t get it
through her head. At last she grew tired of my
explanations and said shortly, as though ending the
conversation, “Tell me one thing, Khamersis. Are
you of the governing class in your land or are you
of the serfs. That’s all I want to know.”
-
-
I sighed and faced her, looking in her
eyes. “I am of those who choose the supreme ruler
of the land, when a new one is to be chosen.” I
said. “I am of those who choose the makers of the
law.”
-
-
“If you are of your country’s Kiphoram,
you are noble enough for me,” she said. “I have
been anxious to accept you as an equal, Khamersis.
And I knew, from the way you handled as lec, that
you were no ordinary man. I thank you for answering
my questions.”
-
-
Her intimation was plain - - the
interview was over. I bowed and left her.
-
-
I think, if I had known what a
stupendous work of Nature the Chinar-ul-Hamek was, I
should have hesitated to suggest that we sail
through it. I had expected a strait several miles
across; I had expected low hills, rising slowly from
the sea on either side; I had expected calm waters.
-
-
But the sight that met my eyes as we
approached the straits, next morning, drove those
expectations from my mind and made me wonder whether
it wouldn’t have been better for me to keep my
advice to myself until I had learned far more of
this world than I then knew.
-
-
For the Chinar was a gap - - a vast gash
cut through a single riven mountain. It was less
than a quarter of a mile from one towering side to
the other, and to the right and to the left of us,
great cliffs thrust their way hugely into the sky;
and I am ready to swear that so high were those
cliffs that the ones to the right were crowned with
clouds. A strong, steady current, with waves that
more often than not were capped with foam, rushed
out into the Var-ul-carid, and along this current
our ship was swept, like a chip in a gutter, after a
rainstorm.
-
-
We were not long in passing through the
Gate, indeed, we were not long enough. We would all
have felt better if it had been harder to leave the
Var-Hamek, for then we might have felt some
certitude of getting back. And there was even
little cheer in the fact that the Mizmari fleet
abandoned us and sailed away, sometime before we
struck the Chinar. When the doughty seaman of the
Mizmari navy gave up their quarry when it was almost
in their hands, it even brought some uncertainties
into my own mind.
-
-
But when, at last, we had run the
gauntlet of those dark cliffs, and had once more
found calm seas and sunlit stillness, my heart, at
least, felt lighter. I said as much to Hupor.
-
-
“We are safe from Kayana’s enemies for
while, now,” I told him, endeavoring to wipe the
scowl from his face as he stood on the bridge. “The
sea here is calm, and we will have time to do what
further plans we must make after we reach Tindar.
Surely it will not be difficult to sail down the
coast to some deserted point and land there.”
-
-
He looked at me and his scowl deepened.
-
-
“Think you it will be so easy,
Khamersis?” he asked, darkly. “Then I say that you
know little of the sea, even less than it is good
for a landsman to know. Look yonder.”
-
-
He pointed off to the right, and I saw a
slowly rising bank of clouds, rosy and beautiful in
the light of the morning sun.
-
-
“Those clouds and this rosy dawn may be
wonderful and beautiful to a landsman, Khamersis,
and even more beautiful may be this calm. But I
tell you, to a seaman, it means foul weather ahead,
and foul weather, in this uncharted sea, may mean
anything.”
-
-
How right he was, became obvious before
another hour had passed. Those innocent clouds of
rose and pearl drew nearer and nearer; the pearl
changed to purple and the purple to gray; the gray
grew darker and more sinister; and at last a steady
wind began to sweep us into the south. The sail was
hauled up, we turned our nose into the wind, and the
tired rowers took their places at the benches, ready
for anything.
-
-
Even as they took their seats, the first
drops of rain began to patter on the deck, and the
wind increased. A moment later, a flash of
lightning lighted up the clouds to the north of us
and with the ensuing crash of the thunder, the storm
broke upon us.
-
-
I had taken my place at the oar with
Haliac. The nose of the ship was pointed into the
wind, and we strove manfully to keep it that way,
for in that way alone would it be possible to ride
out the storm. Once let the waves strike us
broadside, and we would find ourselves either
swamped, or, more than likely, carried uncounted
miles from our present location.
-
-
I turned my head and stole a glance at
the poop deck where Hupor stood, his hands rigid on
the rail, staring into the storm. He bawled on
order to Pharops, an order that was cut in two by a
wave that slapped him in the face. He struggled a
second against the briny spray and finished his
order doggedly. I bent to my oar again.
-
-
To attempt to describe the events that
followed throughout that long day would be folly.
Indeed, in my memory there is little but an
impression of hours of weary toil in the midst of
chaotic and utter confusion. The sky grew darker;
the waves rose higher and higher; in short, it was a
typical a storm at sea as any I could have imagined.
-
-
Our mast went, early in the day. It had
been groaning and creaking ominously since the
beginning of the storm and, several times, I had
seen Hupor eyeing it anxiously. Presently, it
cracked, and I thought it was surely going, then,
but it held stanchly and evidently survived that
particular attack of the wind. But I noticed the
rowers kept their eyes on it from then on, and when
it cracked again, some half hour later, several of
them started nervously, as if to leave their oars.
-
-
And then - - with a great creaking and
cracking, it began to bend, snapped suddenly, liked
a tree struck with lightning, and fell, yards, sail
and all, into the sea. The powers who were in the
way had not been watching in vain; by the time it
struck the deck, they were out of the way. Hupor
bawled more orders, axes appeared, and in less than
a minute the deck had been cleared and the mast was
drifting off to our left.
-
-
By two o’clock, we were at the mercy of
the waves, and we continued so for hours. For the
first time in my life, I learned what acute
seasickness was, and there were many of my
companions, old mariners, who found out that they,
too, were not utterly immune to that discomfort.
-
-
But, sick as we were, we had to thrust
that into the back of our minds and concentrate on
keeping the vessel from capsizing. We no longer
made any attempt to row, but it was necessary to
keep the oars out, and steady, for in this manner
they acted as outriggers and helped to keep the boat
right side up. And if you think it an easy job to
hold and oar steady in a storm of the sort we were
battling - - try it sometime, that’s all.
-
-
During all that day I wrestled at the
oar with my companion, Haliac. Fortunately, neither
of us was hurt by the wild bucking of our oar under
the action of the sea, but there were others not so
fortunate. Four men had broken ribs and one, a
broken arm, by the time the sun had set. The
injured ones had to leave their places, of course,
and were laid on the runway between the rowers; and
you can be sure their loss was keenly felt.
-
-
Hupor, throughout the day, worked like a
Trojan. Not once had he spoken to me; only once had
he looked at me, and then with a look of reproach
that said plainly that he considered me the cause of
all our troubles. Quite surely he believed that the
advice I had given, in the cabin, was going to be
the death of all of us. I felt guilty, for it began
to look as if he was right; and I was grateful, at
least, that he didn’t put his reproaches into words.
-
-
Darkness came, and the storm, if
anything increased its violence. Hour after hour
passed, while Pharops and Hupor struggled to keep a
few little fires burning in the braziers which they
set about the boat, in the hope that we might at
least see each other’s faces in the Stygian
darkness. It must have been about ten o’clock when
there was a cry from the lookout, who, due to the
loss of the mast, was stationed forward, at the
prow.
-
-
“La-and-oh!” he began to cry, and
altered it instantly to: “Land. Land! Breakers
away! Direct on the Bow - - oh!” The last “Oh!”
was a cry of panic, and was followed by such a
jolting grinding crash as I hope never to experience
again in my life.
-
-
The next moment, a great wave dashed
over the starboard side of the vessel and swamped us
completely. There was no doubt what happened. We
had gone around some uncharted land forms in an
unknown sea!
-
-
Chapter Six
-
-
The Hsoli
-
-
-
It was the quickness of Haliac that save
my life at that moment. The entire vessel was
filled with water from that immense wave, and a
great hole had been out in her hull. The wave swept
six of our oarsmen overboard and none of them were
ever seen again.
-
-
At the very moment it struck, Haliac
leaped to the runway, almost instinctively realizing
that the ship was lost. He threw himself up on the
deck of the runway, and by the time the wave struck
us, he had a grip on my collar with one strong hand,
and a grip on the rail with the other. With what
help I could give him, he drew me bodily to the
upper deck, and we stood there, dripping wet and
shivering, trying to collect our thoughts and to
comprehend just what had happened.
-
-
The scene was a bedlam of confusion.
Added to the howling of the wind and the frequent
peals of thunder were the cries of the men who had
been wounded in the battle with the waves and the
appeals of the others for orders. Pharops was
crying out orders, all right, but under the constant
roar of the elements, his orders had little chance
to be heard. The men who heard them - - or imagined
they heard them, - - tried to pass them on, and in
so doing piled an Ossa of uncertainty upon a Pelion
of confusion.
-
-
“The ship is sinking, Khamersis. We’ve
got to abandon it!” Haliac fairly shouted the words
in my ears. I looked up on the poop deck and saw
dimly the form of Hupor, waving his hands about in
an attempt, apparently, to say the same thing in
sign language.
-
-
“The Lady Kayana!” I cried to Haliac.
“She is still in the cabin. We must rescue her!”
-
-
He nodded, a rather reluctant nod, and
when we started off along the narrow runway, holding
on to the railing as we went, I think it was only
loyalty to me that made him follow me. But follow
me he did and we finally reached the balcony before
the cabin door.
-
-
I paused for the briefest moment to look
back at the scene in the body of the vessel. All
around were men, struggling, crying to each other in
various stages of panic, supporting one another and
crying out to a multiplicity of gods for
protection. A number had already thrown themselves
into the sea, a number that was constantly being
added to as more and more of the rowers realized
that the ship was surely doomed.
-
-
Hupor suddenly leaped from the top of
the cabin and joined us. “What do you here,
Khamersis?” he began, and then, remembering my new
status, “Oh, you’re to attend the Lady. Bring her
forward to where the landing boat is. Come, Haliac,
help me to launch the boat.”
-
-
I marveled at the sudden calmness of the
man, who, but a moment before, up there on the poop
deck, had been wildly shouting commands at his men
as if beside himself with panic. He turned away,
and Haliac followed him. I entered the cabin.
-
-
Kayana was seated on a bench at a table
to one side of the room. Her face was white with
fright, and she sat rigid with tenseness. Yet she
sat boldly upright and even nodded royally as I
bowed before her.
-
-
“We must abandon the ship, Lady Kayana,”
I told her. “It is sinking, and we must leave it at
once.” She nodded and rose. She certainly was
playing this royalty game to the last. It seemed a
little silly to me, to be dragging in all that
etiquette and stuff at a time like this, but I guess
if you’ve been raised to that sort of thing, it is
just in times like this that you use it the most.
You don’t know what else to do.
-
-
I took her hand and led her forth from
the cabin. Forward, to where the others held the
landing boat. As I made my way along the deck I
could see that Hupor and Haliac had lowered the boat
already and were striving to hold the lines that
held the little boat to our rapidly sinking vessel.
The ship was listing quite a bit now, and the
progress we made was slow. Had we been able to run
along the deck we might have made it; as it was - -
-
-
A sudden huge wave dashed the landing
boat toward us, the lines Hupor and Haliac held
slackened… and then the wave swept back, carrying
the landing boat away and suddenly tautening those
lines. Haliac’s line was torn from his hands and
Hupor’s snapped suddenly, almost pulling him from
the boat. The landing boat, freed from all
connection with the ship, was swept away and
disappeared in less than a dozen seconds.
-
-
I looked about. The ship was deserted
except for Kayana and I there was little doubt as to
the reason. It would probably be but a very few
minutes until the last portion of the ship would be
underwater. I turned to Kayana, grim with the tale
I must tell her.
-
-
“We’ve got to abandon the ship,” I
said. “And - - we’ve got to trust ourselves to the
mercy of the waves. If we don’t get off of here at
once, we’ll be dragged down with the vessel when he
dives.”
-
-
The Lady Kayana looked out at the waves
and shivered. She turned and looked back at the
ship. “I must trust myself to you, Khamersis,” she
whispered softly. “I - - I am not much of a queen
at this moment, but only a very frightened girl.”
She stepped toward the broken railing and stood
another second looking at the sea. “You must help
me, Khamersis.” she said.
-
-
I put my arm around her shoulder,
tightened it and urged her forward. We leaped. As
we did so, a wild thought came scampering into my
mind and: “You can swim can’t you?” I cried over the
roar of the sea. I heard a “yes” shouted into my
ears and sighed with relief. Can you imagine how
I’d have felt if she’d have answered “no”?
-
-
In the water, we made no attempt to
battle the waves or to swim in the direction of the
vanished boat, or, indeed, in any other direction.
We let ourselves be carried at the will of the
waves, devoting all our attention to keeping our
heads above water. We were separated twice, and
almost lost each other before we decided that it was
necessary to hold on to each other with two of our
arms while we paddled with the other two.
-
-
Kayana tired after an hour or two, and I
was glad that the storm was beginning to break, for
the waves had quieted sufficiently to allow me to
support her head while she floated and thus rested a
bit. My own fatigue, I tried to discount, but, now
that things were quieting down, it began to
represent a serious danger. Once I caught myself
dozing, and jerked awake again in a panic.
-
-
At last, I really must have drifted into
a peculiar light slumber for I dreamed I heard
voices - - the voices of my companions of the ship.
Especially I could hear the voice of Hupor - -
-
-
I could hear the voice of Hupor!
I started up with a jerk. I was awake at once, and
the voice continued. I set up a yell and in another
moment saw the prow of the landing boat moving
toward me. I thrust up a hand to shunt it away,
pushed it to one side and reached for the gun
whale. With my other arm still supporting Kayana, I
roared to Hupor to help me into the boat. The next
moment, the willing hands of Hupor and Haliac were
lifting us into the boat and I was falling into the
thwarts in and excess of exhaustion and resignation.
-
-
It seems almost incredible that I could
have slept in the wet, tossing bottom of that
smelly, little boat, yet for the several hours that
we were tossed to and fro, I can remember no one of
the details. The next thing I remember, Hupor was
shaking my shoulder and as I raised my head
gradually and looked around me, I saw that the storm
had passed and that, under the dim light of the tiny
moon, we were beached on a sandy spit of land, a few
hundred yards from shore.
-
-
We left the boat and trod, a fatigued,
bedraggled group, down the sand spit to the shore.
Hupor and I made a basket seat to carry Kayana, and
tired as I was, the warm arm of the Mizmari princess
thrilled me to added strength.
-
-
We waded through the shallow water to
the sand, and threw ourselves down under a clump of
willow-like bushes beyond the tide-line. As I
released the princess, she clung to my neck just a
moment and looked into my eyes soberly.
-
-
“I owe you much for tonight’s deeds,
Khamersis,” she whispered. “More than my life,
perhaps, for I am the hope of the Vekkan dynasty,
you know.”
-
-
I could find little to answer her. I
realized, of course, that I was falling in love with
Kayana, but I realized, too, that I could hardly
hope to do anything about it. And if she was going
to get serious, with me so fatigued and my powers of
resistance at such an ebb, we might easily start
something we couldn’t finish.
-
-
I stood up. “You owe me nothing Lady,”
I said. “I had a duty to perform, and, being but a
commoner, without even a name I can call my own, I
performed that duty as well as I could.”
-
-
She laughed, a laugh that, if it hadn’t
been so full of fatigue, would have been
mischievous. “Yet it was wonderfully sweet, lying
in your arms out in the sea. Perhaps this will
reward you some.”
-
-
She seized me suddenly and drew my lips
down to hers. For a moment, I swam in ecstasy, then
she pushed me away and, her face flushed so that I
could see it even in the moonlight, she bade me
goodnight. I left her and joined the others, and as
I turned, the last reserves of my energy waned.
Every muscles crying out in agony, I threw myself on
the ground and was asleep instantly.
-
-
The sun was high in the heavens when I
awoke. I glanced about me and sat up, surprised at
the fact that I no longer ached and hurt in every
joint. Without a doubt I had slept for eight or
nine hours, and the rest had done me a wonderful
amount of good. A dozen yards or so away from me,
Kayana lay, still sleeping, on a bed of fern and
mosses that Hupor had probably made for her, after I
had passed out, the night before.
-
-
Hupor himself was stooping over on the
beach, not far away, discussing something with
Pharops. Where this worthy had come from, I did not
know at the time, but I was later to learn that he
and several of the rowers had managed to reach the
island, and had come upon us an hour or so before I
awoke. Hupor straightened up as I approached him
and called to me.
-
-
“Look here, Khamersis. What make you of
this?” He pointed to the sand of the beach and I
noticed a track of footprints in the sand,
footprints that seemed, from the distance I was, to
be the tracks of human beings.
-
-
I drew near and inspected them more
closely. These footprints weren’t human after all,
though the fact that there were prints of but two
feet made it obvious that they were made by some
sort of biped. But close observation showed that
the toes were clawed, that there were but four of
them, and that the innermost toe was almost like a
thumb. But most sinister of all was the fact that
the general outlines of the print made it plain that
it was not the print of a mammal of any sort, but
most plainly the print of a reptile!
-
-
My mind leaped back to my other life, to
my days in college when I had inspected, in the
museum, a huge slab of limestone with the tracks of
a small dinosaur preserved in it. The prints looked
more like the tracks of that dinosaur than anything
else I had ever seen.
-
-
I raised my eyes questioningly to
Hupor. “What sort of animal makes such tracks as
these?” I asked.
-
-
His scowl deepened. “No such animal as
I have ever seen, Khamersis,” he said. “Though when
I was a lad, my mother used to frighten me with
tales of the legendary Hsoli, the lizard-men whom
once held men in thrall. And if those mythical
creatures left footprints,” he went on, with a
significant emphasis, “they might well be such
footprints as these.”
-
-
I might have scoffed at his
superstitions, had I not remembered that only
yesterday I had done so; and had blithely suggested
this flight into the Var-ul-carid which had resulted
in our present plight. It came to me that, in this
world or which I was so ignorant, it might be well
not to scoff at superstitions until I knew what
were superstitions and what were facts.
-
-
And it was well that I held my tongue,
for at the very moment, a cry from one of the
oarsmen (of whom six had managed to get to shore
turned our attention from the footprint. He was
pointing to a place beyond the tress in the
background; and, looking there, we saw a strange
sight.
-
-
Rising over the trees was a huge
creature as big as a deer an animal with broad
bat-like wings and four legs that held a rider on
its back, a rider whose feet were fixed in stirrups
and whose hands held reins with which he guided the
creature toward us.
-
-
I was about to burst into a cheer and
call to the rider when something stopped me. There
was something queer about the shape of the fellow, -
something a little wrong, - - he turned his head
suddenly and I gasped, for either the fellow had a
horrible green mask on, or - -
-
-
Hupor had gasped, too; and Pharops had
ejaculated, “The Hsoli!” Then, speechless, we all
stared at the apparition, while it flew nearer and
nearer, coolly inspected us and, turning, flew away
in the direction from which it had come.
-
-
I had gotten a good look at the rider
when he was at his closest. The thing could, by no
manner of means, be called even remotely human. It
was a reptile, pure and simple; green, scaly and
scrawny; and although the proportion of the limbs
and its high forehead and forward-looking eyes gave
it a curious, caricature-like resemblance to the
human, that suggestion only made it all the more
horrible.
-
-
And still more horrible was its obvious
intelligence, for it wore a curious head-dress of
leather and metal, and was armed with an ax and a
shield.
-
-
Hupor watched, motionless, until the
creature had disappeared once more beyond the
distance trees. Then he sprang into action. He
leaped among the oarsmen, waking those that were
sleeping and slapping the others into action.
-
-
“Awaken, ye dolts!” he bawled. “We must
get away from here! That thing has gone to bring
more of its kind. It seems that in this part of the
world, our grandmothers’ tales are true. Up! Come
on, get up! We must be away from here before they
return.”
-
-
But alas! We had little time to flee.
Hupor rallied the group of seamen and awoke Kayana,
and with the ghanvarrek on one side of the Lady and
me on the other, we started down the beach, the
others following closely after.
-
-
We hoped to find a cave or shelter of
some sort where we might not be seen from the air,
but we had not fled a half a mile before we saw a
group of the weird riders – at least twenty - - rise
above the trees at the point where the other one had
disappeared, and sweep down on us.
-
-
We broke into a run, but the flight of
the winged, deer-like creatures was far faster than
the best speed we could make, so when we came
suddenly on a huge outcropping of rock, we decided
to make our stand there, and sell our lives as early
as possible.
-
-
Haliac and Hupor, Pharops and myself and
tow of the oarsmen carried lecs. We placed Kayana
in a small fissure of the rock, and Hupor and I took
our places on either side, surrounded by others.
The group of reptile men flew up to us, circled a
time or two as though reconnoitering, and then
landed a score or more yards away. They dismounted
from their strange steeds and, drawing their axes,
approached us cautiously.
-
-
We stood and watched them warily for a
few minutes, while they kept their distance, seeming
to discuss us in a hissing undertone. Presently one
of them came forward a little, holding his ax
inverted, evidently as a sign of truce. He spoke in
some language, evidently a human one, judging from
the difficulty he had with it, but it was one that I
did not understand, or did any of the others, so far
as I could see. Hupor spoke up.
-
-
“We speak Mizmari,” he said. “Can you
talk in that language, lizard?”
-
-
The other was, apparently, little
offended by the insult implied in that last word.
He changed easily into the language which Hupor had
spoken.
-
-
“I speak many languages, ape, and in all
of them, I demand submission from you and from your
group. Will you yield or fight?”
-
-
“We’ll fight,” Hupor answered curtly.
-
-
The creature did not argue. It turned
about and returned to its fellows, and no sooner had
it reached them than it turned its ax in its hand
and hissed a command. And the creatures came at us
in a rush.
-
-
I have said, in more places than one,
that I had inherited, from that mysterious previous
possessor of my body, an ability to wield a lec like
a master. But no sooner had I engaged with one of
these creatures than I realized that I was up
against a form of fighting that was utterly strange
to me, and to any memory of fighting which I
possessed. In the first place, the axes of the
Hsoli, as Hupor called the strange creatures, were
shorter and heavier than lecs; and in the next
place, they had, through long centuries of using
them, devised a system far different from the one I
knew, and yet as complicated and as effective as the
lec-fighting of the men Mizmar.
-
-
So it was that I found it hard to even
hold my own, at first, and so it was that we lost
several of our men before the battle was well
begun. There were but six of us, and there were
eighteen of them, when the ruse that conquered us
was perpetrated. Six of the Hsoli withdrew from the
fight, leaving twelve to engage us while they
crawled around the back of the stone and, hurling
themselves from the top of the rock, landed full
upon us. We went down, of course, all of us at
once, and in less time than it takes to tell of it,
we were helpless in the hands of the lizard-men.
-
-
Chapter Seven
-
-
The Crown of Might
-
-
-
They trussed us up, saying nothing to us
as they worked, not even attempting to answer a
question or two that some of the rowers asked them.
About a dozen of them than mounted their flying
creatures and rose into the air, taking the other’s
creatures with them too. The six that were left
jerked us to our feet, and with hobbled ankles and
hands tied behind us, we were driven into the trees,
coming presently to a trail along which we were led.
-
-
I spoke little to my companions aw we
were herded along, for I still had a guilty feeling
that they blamed my hasty advice of the day before
for our predicament. But after a half hour or so of
silence, Hupor seemed to reach a decision, for he
turned to me and said:
-
-
“Why so glum Khamersis? Do you fear
what we are to meet at the end of this trail?”
-
-
“I could face it more cheerfully if I
knew that my companions had forgiven me for my
advice of yesterday,” I answered.
-
-
He laughed shortly.
-
-
“As to that,” he said. “If we had not
taken your advice, we would most assuredly be in
Kalsus’ hands by now. And I cannot imagine that he
and Renthapes, the Lord of Phend, would have treated
us with any more consideration than these sons of
Zebantu will.”
-
-
“Which causes me to ask, Hupor - - what
are these creatures who have caught us?”
-
-
“Why, they are the Hsoli, that’s all.”
He looked at me, puzzled, as if anybody should know
what the Hsoli were. Then he laughed once again,
the same short, rueful laugh that he had before.
-
-
“I had forgotten your origin for a
moment, Khamersis,” he said. “The Hsoli are a group
of creatures that have long been thought mere myths,
mere old wives tales designed to scare children.
There is never a babe in all Mizmar, Tindar of Phend
who had not pulled the covers over his head and
closed his eyes in fear when his grandmother told
him of the terrible lizard-men who eat up little
babies.
-
-
“But no one, when he grows up really
believes in them. The origin of the legend goes
back to an earlier form of our religion. According
to the tale, once all space belonged to Zebantu, the
lord of darkness and evil. When Zor, the
light-father, entered the world, his light showed
these creatures. It was to combat them that he
created Man, and many of our myths deal with the
Great War between the Hsoli and the Children of
Zor. In the end, man won, of course, and the Hsoli
retreated from the world to Ephar, the underworld.
-
-
“But that was all in the old, old days,
and it is believed in the Three Countries that the
Hsoli are all dead now, and all but forgotten.
Apparently the idea’s wrong, eh, Khamersis?”
-
-
“Wrong, indeed,” I answered, absently.
I was wondering just how these strange creatures
really had come to be on this world. Hupor’s story
was good enough for myth and to satisfy a
superstitious, barbarous people, but to one who has
had the advantage of terrestrial education, it
failed to satisfy. The humans with whom I had come
into contact on this world were so exactly like the
people of my own world that I had subconsciously
presupposed an evolutionary current exactly similar
to the one with which I was familiar.
-
-
But this put a new light on affairs. It
dawned on me that there might be many creatures on
this planet totally unlike the creatures of earth.
Indeed, those deer-like flying creatures suggested
that there were.
-
-
“Are those flying steeds of the Hsoli
like anything you ever saw, Hupor?” I asked.
-
-
He nodded. “Wild ones are found in the
mountains of northern Phend,” he replied. I have
heard that the people there hunt them for their
meat. But they are much smaller than these, and I
never heard of anyone trying to ride them. We call
them thurwani.”
-
-
Whilst we were talking, we had been led
along the trail up a long hill. We reached the
summit and started down the other side, and the
woods began to thin out into a meadowland of a broad
valley. Far away, beyond a ridge, I behold the
thatched roofs of a group of houses, and it was
toward these houses that the Hsoli led us. Within
an hour after we started, we entered this village of
the lizard-men, to be greeted by a squalling mob of
the creatures, who had evidently been appraised of
our arrival by the group who had flown there ahead
of us.
-
-
There were vastly more males than
females in the crowd, I noticed, and few young; but
it seemed that the females and young made up in
hideousness what they lacked in numbers, and more
than made up in hissing, snarling vociferousness.
They ran along beside us, such of them as could worm
their way through the crowd, and it was obvious that
we were a wonder such as had not been seen in many a
long day. Quite clearly, we were as great a wonder
to them as they were to us.
-
-
We wended our way through the village to
the huge stony hill beyond. As I drew near the
hill, I saw something that caused me to blink my
eyes and wonder if I could trust them. I gazed
again - - it was true! - - though I had
doubted at first, the great stony hill was not truly
a hill at all, but the cyclopean ruins of a city, a
city that must have once been as great, or greater
than that might work of man that stands at the mouth
of the Hudson in my own World!
-
-
And to these great ruins we were led,
and at their very base, a larger hut was built, a
hut that was decorated elaborately and that had a
number of guards at its entrance, a hut that was
obviously the “palace” of the leader of the Hsoli.
-
-
Evidently our coming had already been
announced, for as we drew near, a dozen or so of the
creatures came out, armed and capped with their
eternal headdresses of green leather and metal, and
last of all came one who, without a doubt, was their
leader.
-
-
I say without a doubt, for there were
several things that set him apart from the others.
His ax, which he wore at his belt, was of some deep
red metal, and was studded with precious stones, and
was clearly more of an ornament than a weapon. He
was much larger than the average Hsoli, indeed he
was almost seven feet tall, and fat into the
bargain. And on his head he wore a cap or headdress
entirely different from that of any of the others.
-
-
It was a tall cap, and heavy with red
and green jewels, it was red, rather than green,
like the others, and there seemed something about it
that suggested that it might be a complicated
machine. I surely saw a wire here and there, and
right in the front were two peculiar dials.
-
-
We were led up in front of this creature
and our bonds were out. Our captors stepped one to
each side of us, and held our arms. For several
minutes we stood there in silence while the chief
looked us over. Then he spoke. He spoke in
Mizmari, and he spoke to Hupor and I, apparently.
-
-
“Is that true?” he asked.
-
-
I looked at him, puzzled. “Is what
true?”
-
-
He made no answer for the moment, but
one of the guards moved back into the palace and
returned shortly, bearing two of the helmets such as
all the lizards wore. They clapped them on our
heads and for another moment there was silence.
Then a puzzled and half-frightened look came into
the eyes of the chief and he spoke again.
-
-
“It is what might be suspected of such a
low form of life,” he sneered. “You are not even
susceptible to the crown of might. These caps that
I put upon your heads are instruments by which all
Hsoli can communicate with their chief without
speech. But with humans, it seems I must use
speech, as I would with the lower animals.”
-
-
He ordered the caps removed from our
heads and then spoke again. “Tell me whence you
come, and why you came here.”
-
-
Kayana and Hupor, toward whom he had
been looking when he spoke, made no answer. I was
about to speak when Kayana flashed me a negative
glance and I maintained my silence. We stood there
insoucinantly until we saw that the chief was
beginning to lose his temper, then Hupor said
languidly to Pharops, “Tell him what he wants to
know.”
-
-
Pharops faced the Hsoli chief, his
single eye gleaming defiantly as he said curtly and
briefly, “WE are Mizmari, and we were shipwrecked
during the storm of yesterday.”
-
-
“Mizmari!” the chief snapped angrily.
“Since when have Mizmari been sailing into the
Var-ul-carid?”
-
-
We made no answer. Certain things were
beginning to be very plain to me, and I think to
Hupor, too. These Hsoli may have been very powerful
at one time, but that time was certainly long past.
Now, there were reduced to but a remnant, a savage,
ignorant remnant of their one time strength, and
they skulked here on this distant island, safe only
as long as their existence was not guessed by the
humans who had conquered them.
-
-
And now - - they had been discovered by
humans, humans who might return to tell of their
discovery and to bring more humans to conquer and
exterminate them. It began to look pretty bad for
us, for I knew what I would have done had I been in
the place of the Hsoli.
-
-
The chief was continuing his questioning
of Pharops, and at Hupor’s bidding, Pharops
continued to answer. After some ten minutes of
questioning, he had managed to worm out of us the
most of our story, at least as much as we were
willing to tell. Then he spoke to us an spoke in
the manner of a judge delivering a sentence.
-
-
“Children of Zor,” he said. “There has
been little love lost between the Hsoli and you,
since the first ape dropped from the trees and held
a stone in his hand for a weapon. If it had not
been that the Hsoli and already forgotten their
ancient wisdom, even then, the children of the ape
might never have attained their present might.
-
-
“But they did forget it, or at least
most of it, and now men swarm over all the
continents of the carid, while we of the
Hsoli, who should own the world by right of
priority, are cooped up on this tiny island. Little
harm can we do the race of man at this late day - -
but what little harm we can do, that will we must
surely do.
-
-
“So I decree that you be imprisoned
until the night of the next full moon and that when
you be killed for the pleasure and sport of our
populace, after which your bodies will go to provide
food for myself and my soldiers.”
-
-
He gave a curt no and, without saying a
word to any of his guards or to our captors, he
walked back into his “palace”. Evidently the power,
whatever it was, that reposed in the so-called crown
of might was working, for the guards seemed to know
just what to do with us. They led us into the ruins
and presently we were herded into a group of cells,
a huge wooden door was slammed shut, and we were
left alone.
-
-
“What’s all this about this crown of
might,” I asked as soon as we were alone. You never
told me anything about that when you spoke of the
legends of the Hsoli, Hupor.”
-
-
“Because I never heard of it,” he
answered. “From the way the chief talked, he uses
it to speak to his subjects in some strange way. I
know nothing of it.”
-
-
He seemed to communicate directly, mind
to mind,” I said. “If that’s what I think it is,
that cap confers the power of telepathy.
Telepathy,” I went on, using the English word
because there is no word in Mizmari to correspond to
it, “is the power of reading minds and of sending
your own thought into another’s mind.” Have any of
you ever heard of the Hsoli having such a power?”
-
-
One of the powers spoke up diffidently.
-
-
“I might know a little something that
would help you,” he said hesitantly, and when Hupor
roared, “Well, speak up, man!” he bowed before
Kayana and said:
-
-
“My father was a great scholar, and read
many books, many old and forgotten books in the
library at Mizrend. Much he read of the old, old
days when Zor and Zebantu fought for the possession
of the earth, and in these stories he found much
that he told to me. And there was mention of this
so-called crown of might. Isn’t that what the Hsoli
called that crown of his?”
-
-
“Aye, by the beard of Zebantu!” cried
Hupor. “Now we’re getting someplace. What did your
father read about this crown?”
-
-
“It was said that through it, the chief
of the Hsoli governed all his people and that while
he wore it, none could disobey him. Yet if the
crown fell from his head fro but a single moment,
while it remained off, the people were no longer
Hsoli, but became mere thought less animals.”
-
-
Hupor frowned. “I like not that tale,”
he said. It seems to partake too much of the dust
of the bull’s tail. I never was one to take much
stock in magic.”
-
-
I spoke up eagerly. An amazing theory
had come to me, an idea that seemed to explain this
whole mystery, and to offer an ideal chance for me
to make amends for the predicament into which my
advice had led us.
-
-
“Hupor,” I said. “And, you, Lady
Kayana. Listen to me. Suppose that, thousands of
years ago, maybe long before there were men, even,
this crown of might had been invented and that for
all the years since then, the common Hsoli had been
controlled by their leaders by this method. It
might well be that in time the common ones would
become mere machines, depending utterly on their
leaders for orders.
-
-
“If that were true, it would explain the
legends, and it might give us a chance to escape,
too, for if I could get within reach of the leader
again, I might knock his crown from his head and
render them all helpless.”
-
-
Hupor looked doubtful. “’Tis a
farfetched idea, Khamersis,” he said. “And the more
I think of the actions of the Hsoli, when they were
before the king, and of the words of the king, the
more I think there is truth to the tale.”
-
-
Hupor shook his head. “I’m afraid it is
stretching the tale too far, Khamersis,” he said.
“”Twould avail us little, even if it were so, for I
doubt if we will get a chance to see the chief
again.”
-
-
Kayana stepped forward and laid a hand
on my arm.
-
-
“If you have no other plan to discuss,
ghanvarrek,” she said to Hupor, “would it not be
well to use Khamersis’ plan? After all, we cannot
remain here, meekly awaiting the time of our death.
And Khamersis feels that he is partly responsible
for our predicament, and were that plan successful,
it might restore his confidence in himself.”
-
-
Hupor grinned ruefully.
-
-
“Your word, as ever, is law, Lady,” he
stated. “But I fear it will put Khamersis further
into the hole in which he has placed himself.”
-
-
“If it does, we’ll be dead and won’t
mind,” I reminded him.
-
-
He said no more, and for a time neither
did I. I had taken a job, and it began to look as
if it were a pretty steep one. Briefly, my first
bit of business was to get before the Hsoli chief
again. And I couldn’t seem to imagine a plan that
would bring that individual within reach of me. He
had definitely decided what to do with us, and,
until the day of our execution came, he probably
cared little what became of us, so long as we didn’t
die.
-
-
So long as we didn’t die? There might
be a thought there. For over an hour I sat, deep in
thought, then I arose and called my friends to me.
-
-
“In the old days, in my world, there was
a disease called the ‘king’s evil’,” I told them.
It was called this because there was a belief that
it could be cured by the touch of a king.” I
smiled. “I think I am about to contract that
disease.”
-
-
Haliac looked at me concernedly, but
Hupor and Kayana saw the point and smiled broadly.
I lay down on the floor of the dungeon and set up
such a groan that it must have been heard all the
way back to the chief’s house. Hupor whispered a
word or two to the seamen, and immediately they all
set u a wild and panic-stricken clamor.
-
-
It was sometime before it made any
impression on the Hsoli, but after about fifteen
minutes a guard came rushing, commanding that the
turmoil cease immediately. Hupor and Haliac met him
at the door, vociferous in their pleas to be taken
from the call, forthwith.
-
-
“He dies!” Hupor roared. “Our
companion dies, and soon we shall all be dead if we
are left here with him. Take us out of here before
we all perish.”
-
-
The guard stood silent for a moment, and
it seemed apparent to me that he was communicating
with his chief. “What is this disease that he dies
of?” he asked, presently. “Is it a disease
dangerous to Hsoli?”
-
-
“’Tis the king’s evil,” Hupor answered,
still clamoring at the door. “’Tis the most fatal
disease in all Mizmar. If you wish to have any
humans left when the full moon comes, you had best
let us out of here.”
-
-
Again the pause, then the guard said
slowly, “You call it the king’s evil. Is that
because it affects kings?”
-
-
“Le me out,” Hupor roared for answer.
“While you talk, I may fell the pangs of the disease
at any moment,” he pause, then answered the
question. “’Tis called the king’s evil because
naught can cure it save the touch from the handoff a
king.”
-
-
Again the guard locked thoughtful.
-
-
“Now that is indeed strange,” he said.
A moment of silence, then: “Our chief comes at
once,” he said. “He wishes to see if this power
lies in his hand.”
-
-
He turned away and strode off, and Hupor
took the opportunity to seize my hand and wring it
in a congratulatory grip. We let our clamor die
down, and when we heard the chief coming, a few
minutes later, we became a tense and serious group.
-
-
When he entered the cell, the men were
all gathered around me, while Kayana stood in a
corner of the cell and pretended to weep softly.
The chief gave a sneering glance at her, then strode
over, accompanied by his officers and looked down at
me. My eyes were half closed, but I noticed that he
had brought at least a dozen Hsoli with him, and I
uttered a short prayer that my hunches (for, after
all, that’s all they were) were correct.
-
-
“This man looks none too ill,” he said,
shrewdly, looking at me and then turning to Hupor.
-
-
The ghanvarrek shook his head. “That is
always said of the man who dies of king’s evil,”
Hupor muttered in reply. “’Tis all inside, chief.
Yet a single touch of your hand will restore him.
-
-
The chief looked around. He must have
been reassured by the rather negligent attitudes of
the men, for he stepped forward hurriedly, touched
me with his cold paw, and then started to step back
again.
-
-
“But I had been ready. As he stepped
forward, I had tensed myself; as he touched me, I
sprang; and before he could step back, I had seized
the crown of might and dashed it to the floor,
-
-
Chapter Eight
-
-
Flight to Mizmar
-
-
-
A man might have counted five while the
entire group stood there, human and Hsoli alike,
frozen into a tableau. Then the humans gradually
realized that the lizard-men were frozen for an
entirely different reason than they were, and
summoning their amazed faculties, they hurled
themselves on their enemies. As they did so, the
chief, realizing for the first time what had
happened, gave a snarl of fury and hurled himself
upon me.
-
-
I had half risen to my feet, but his
assault toppled me backward again, and the next
thing I knew, I was locked in his cold embrace and
striving desperately to keep his hands from my
throat. From the corner of my eye, I could see that
the other men had closed with their enemies and that
the dazed Hsoli were making little attempt to oppose
them.
-
-
I saw Hupor seize an ax from the belt of
one of the guards and bury it in that guard’s head
with no more opposition than a child might offer to
a slap in the face. For the others, the situation
seemed well in hand, but for myself - -
-
-
The chief, of course, had been the
intelligence which, through the crown of might, had
controlled all of the Hsoli. Without his control,
they were reduced to a level little higher than
idiots. But the chief still possessed his own
intelligence, and was a dangerous as ever.
-
-
And he was particularly dangerous to me
at that particular moment. We thrashed about and
rolled over the floor, now bumping into the legs of
some Hsoli, now into some man. The creature’s hands
were at my throat and, though I had both of his
wrists in my grip, his fingers moved closer and
closer to my windpipe.
-
-
I was at a distinct disadvantage in that
I had to hold him as close as possible to me in
order to keep him from using the sharp claws on his
toes. His legs were far more agile and supple than
a man’s, and his feet were armed with sharp claws
which he constantly tried to get up to my stomach.
I knew that he could almost disembowel me with a
single blow, so it became a problem of just how
close I could hold him without letting him reach my
throat with his hands. And it was a problem,
I’ll tell you.
-
-
I managed to get an elbow under his
chin. That, incidentally, reminds me that there was
another thing I had to protect myself from - - the
lizard-like mouth with its long jaw of fangs. It
began to look as if nature had equipped this
creature with natural arms that could make it far
superior to man when it came to hand to hand combat.
-
-
But presently I managed to give a quick
turn and with a sudden twist, I found myself on top,
the Hsoli chief underneath and my elbow still
against his throat. He gave a flop or two, and I
perceived another advantage. The peculiarly flat
body of the reptile was ill-equipped to turn over
with an opponent on it. Anyone who has ever seen a
lizard or a crocodile on its back knows that it has
a hard enough time turning over by itself, without
having to contend with an opponent while it does it.
-
-
So, seeing this slight advantage, I
pressed it - - and pressed my elbow deeper into his
throat, into the bargain. After a moment of this,
he seemed to be a little less enthusiastic about the
fight. His movement became slower, and I had a
chance to glance around to see if I might find
something to aid me in my fight. Whatever fate it
is that watches over me must have been on the job at
that moment, for not two yards away I saw a dad
Hsoli lying, with an ax still in his belt. I
reached for the weapon with my free hand, but it was
just out of my reach. The Hsoli chief seemed to be
about to pass out, so I gave a final squeeze to his
throat and leaped from him to retrieve the weapon.
-
-
The Hsoli chief had been feinting! My
leap was no faster than his, - - he leaped full upon
my back, and I fell across the dead Hsoli, crushed
by his weight, even as my hand touched the ax. I
gripped the weapon desperately, twisted violently
and managed to turn. There was little room to swing
the ax, I seized the nose in my right hand, and,
using the blade like you would use a chisel, I
hacked at the Hsoli’s neck.
-
-
Like all lecs and axes that are used as
weapons in the carid, the Hsoli ax was as sharp as a
razor. Before the chief could twist away I had
inflicted a pretty serious would, and he was forced
to leap off of me to avoid losing his head
entirely. As he leaped up, with surprise and pain
written on his face, I leaped after him and swung
the ax at the same moment, with all my strength.
-
-
It landed, true and hard, square upon
his skull. The Hsoli chief fell, twisting and
flopping, his hands holding his head, from which
blood and gray matter were streaming. I struck him
again, but still he flopped about, and then I
remembered how hard it is to kill a reptile. I
turned away, confident that the blows I had dealt
him were mortal and that he would soon cease his
struggles.
-
-
I glanced around and saw that what had
been a battle for me had been but a slaughter for my
friends. They had had almost no opposition from the
dazed Hsoli and they had killed them to the last
one. Even as I rose to my feet, Hupor had turned
from slaying his last enemy and had stridden toward
me, intending to give me aid.
-
-
But it was Kayana that reached me
first. She flung her hands to my shoulders and
looked me over anxiously. “Are you hurt,
Khamersis?” she cried. “Did he damage you any?”
-
-
“I’m not even scratched,” I answered,
“though I would have suffered much for the reward
that you have given me, princess.”
-
-
She flushed and dropped her arms. “You
have done noble work Khamersis,” she said. “And the
reward is not commensurate with what you deserve. A
greater reward may be forthcoming if ever I sit upon
the throne of my fathers.”
-
-
She turned and looked defiantly at
Hupor, but that worthy had turned his head in the
opposite direction, and was trying to smile broadly
and whistle at the same time, and, of course,
failing signally.
-
-
We armed ourselves with the weapons of
the guards, and left the prison, walking cautiously
and uncertainly, peering around every corner and
wondering every moment if we would be attacked. But
though we saw Hsoli here and there, they paid no
attention to us; indeed, they seemed to pay
attention to nothing; they moved in a sort of daze,
like a man who has received a hard blow and hasn’t
yet been able to assemble his faculties.
-
-
By the time we were out of the maze of
ruins and into the Hsoli village again, we had grown
so used to seeing the lizard-men moving about in
this dazed fashion that we paid them no more heed
than they were paying us. It was our intent to
return to the seashore, but just before we left the
town, we passed a long, low building from which came
a continuous series of bleating noises, and, curious
to know what this could be, Hupor and I paused long
enough to glance within.
-
-
A second sufficed to show us that it was
a stable of the huge thurwani, the creatures which
the Hsoli used for mounts. I would have passed on,
my curiosity satisfied, but Hupor suddenly pulled me
back when I would have left.
-
-
“Khamersis,” he said. “These creatures
fly!”
-
-
“True enough,” I answered. “But why
make an issue of it? We knew that before.”
-
-
“But - - I’ve an idea. A wild one, I’ll
admit, - - so wild, indeed that I’d like to have you
hear it before I suggest it to any of the others.
These creatures fly, as I say, and they’ll fly over
water as well as land.”
-
-
He stopped, and I looked at him,
puzzled. I had an idea of what he was driving at,
but it seemed so farfetched that I could hardly
believe that my idea was right. The ghanvarrek saw
my realization of his plan in my eyes, and nodded
enthusiastically.
-
-
“You’ve guessed it!” he said,
astoundingly. “That’s just what I’m proposing, that
we attempt to fly these creatures back to Mizmar.
We have no ship; it would take weeks to make one,
and by that time Kalsus could consolidate, his
position and conquer Luplar and the loyal ones in
the mountains. Kayana would find herself in the
hands of Renthapes of Phend, and the navies of the
Three Countries would be scouring the seas for a
certain pirate.
-
-
“But if we can fly back to
Mizmar, we might be there in a day or so. “Twould
be no great distance as the thurwani flies. We
might make it in a night and a day.”
-
-
I shook my head dubiously.
-
-
“I know little of these matters of
geography,” I said. “But of the thurwani I can
imagine much. “Twill be much more than just leaping
on the creature’s back and flying off into the
sunrise. If one of those creatures chose to throw
you after he had risen a thousand feet or so - -
well, he’d never have to do it a second time.”
-
-
“We’d have to spend some time in
learning to ride them, true enough,” agreed Hupor.
“But even so, I imagine we’d save much time. When I
think of the kind of ship we’d have to build and the
labor and time it would take to fight our way up the
Chinar-Ar, I believe that anything that would get us
to Mizmar would be better than that.”
-
-
I shrugged. “Let us take the creatures
then, and see what can be done. Apparently these
stablemen will offer no resistance.”
-
-
So Hupor gave an order and we led out
nine of the winged creatures, one for each of the
remaining members of our party. The Hsoli who had
charge of the creatures made no effort to stop us;
one of them did snarl as we walked past him, but the
remainder merely looked at us in a dumb and
uninterested manner. So it was that, an hour or so
later, we emerged on the beach of the island with
the animals safely under our control.
-
-
And here we set up our camp and set
about learning what we could of the thurwani. The
day ended, and we posted a watch and slept. Another
day came and went. Hupor had bridled a thurwani;
had ridden it around the beach, and at last had
taken a short flight. He found the creature
remarkably docile and tractable, and not very
difficult to guide. By the time he had ridden it
around the island several times, I began to agree
that his plan was in no wise as absurd as it had
sounded in the stables.
-
-
I undertook to take a ride myself, and
found the creature a lot easier to ride than a
horse. The others grew bolder, too, and after
listening to a lecture by Hupor, decided to try
their creatures, too. At last even Kayana was
allowed to mount one of them, and after she had
taken the creature around the island twice, without
Hupor’s help, we agreed that we truly did have the
means to take us to the mainland, and probably to
Mizmar, too.
-
-
So, some three days after we had
escaped, we rose early, and, with our pouches filled
with food, and with the Hsoli axes for arms, we
mounted our thurwani, gave the command to take off,
and were soon flying into the rising sun. We rose
higher and higher and at about a thousand feet, we
leveled off and started for our goal.
-
-
We flew for hours over the sea. It
would be pointless to tell of our flight in detail,
for there simply was no detail. The sea below and
the sky above were calm and clear. The thurwani
were docile and easily handled. We grew more and
more confident as things went on so well, and we got
so that we could fly our creatures from one to
another, carrying on a continuous conversation.
-
-
At last, as evening came, we saw the
mainland in the distance. A short colloquy with
Hupor made us decide to spend the night on the beach
and to go on until next day. This we did, and as
there was nothing worthy of note that happened that
night, I pass it by and tell of the balance of our
flight, next day.
-
-
That flight was over mountains and
desert; it was far more tiring that the exhilarating
sea flight of the day before, because of the
desert’s heat, but it ended at last about three
o’clock in the afternoon. The desert ended suddenly
at the foot of a range of low hills; these low hills
grew slowly into rounded mountains of a fairly
respectable size, and at last Hupor turned to
Kayana.
-
-
“You had better take charge, now, Lady,”
he said. “From here on, Hupor must place himself in
the hands of his queen.”
-
-
Kayana looked down and gave a short cry
of momentary surprise and delight. “The hills of
Haval!” she exclaimed. “I hadn’t been watching.
Why, we are but a few miles from Luplar’s
rendezvous.
-
-
“Where he doubtless watches and waits
impatiently,” Hupor said.
-
-
So it was that, half an hour or so
later, we rode our thurwani down into a little
hidden valley where hundreds of tents and hundreds
of soldiers showed clearly that a fairly respectable
army had been gathered.
-
-
We landed some distance away from the
camp, but the soldiers of Luplar were on their toes,
and it was not a dozen seconds before we were
surrounded by a couple of squads and led off to the
leader. The soldiers were respectful but insistent,
and it was plain that none of these particular men
were acquainted with the Lady Kayana.
-
-
But when we were led up to the tent of
the commander, we knew that our troubles were over,
at least for the time being. For Luplar, the high
priest, came forth from his tent, spied Kayana and
rushed forward booming greetings. He was huge man,
and an old one, but he presented a far different
picture from the one that I had formed of him. I
had expected an ascetic, quiet, elderly man, and the
only thing that tallied with my expectations was the
fact that he was old. But with his fat and his long
white beard and his twinkling eyes, he presented an
appearance more of a Santa Claus in armor than
anything else I can suggest.
-
-
“Ul-Zor-shareeb, majesty!” he
thundered, rushing forward and laying his hands in
Kayana’s. “Right welcome, indeed are you; right
welcome and more. We had given you up for dead, and
were at all loss to know where our loyalty lay.
-
-
‘We have not been able to find your
sisters and, indeed, we know not if they are even
still alive. We had begun to fear that the seed of
Nemar was extinct. Thank Zor we have a standard to
rally round again. And now, by signs he had sent
soldiers running for chairs while he spoke and, with
their return he motioned us to be seated, never once
ceasing his talk, “and now, sit ye down and tell me
of your adventures. And tell me also of those
strange creatures which we saw you ride into the
valley.”
-
-
We took seats, and Kayana, sprightlier
than I had ever seen her before, began to tell him
of our adventures. Dinner time came and he ordered
food to be brought, but all during our meal, the
story kept up, for Luplar continually interrupted it
with speculations and questions, and it became
evident that here was a man who was not only a
genius, but a practical leader of men, too. The
keenness of his insight and the wideness of his
knowledge made me feel that he would not have been
out of place even on the earth.
-
-
He was especially interested in the
thurwani, and had them brought before him, even
going so far as to have a couple of our seamen fly
their creatures over the valley in order to see how
they responded to human commands.
-
-
“These creatures may well save all of us
and end this rebellion,” the high priest said, as we
were discussing the creatures that evening after
supper. “I think there is something important in
the fact that they can fly over the walls of the
city. Of course, it would be impossible to carry
any sizeable fore into Mizrend, for there are only
nine of the, but…”
-
-
He halted suddenly in his speech, for
there had been a shout outside of the tent, a shout
that was immediately challenged by the guard. There
was unintelligible reply to the guard’s challenge,
and then the curtains were pulled aside and the
guard entered, accompanied by another soldier.
-
-
The man was panting, perspiration was
dripping from his brow and he stood looking dazedly
at us for a minute before he dropped on one knee
before Luplar.
-
-
“They have found us, your grace!” he
croaked. “It is treason of some kind. They are
pouring into the valley by way of the north pass!”
-
-
Luplar sprang from his chair, roaring.
-
-
“You’re sure they’re not men of our
party?” he shouted.
-
-
“Positive! They wear the uniform of
Kalsus’ own guards. You can see them plainly, from
the point.”
-
-
Luplar turned to the guard.
-
-
“Get the council here, at once,” he
cried. “Tell the od-helia to assemble their
companies.” He turned to us. “There is no more
time to talk now,” he went on. “Some traitor has
led Kalsus to our hiding place and the issue is
joined. There will be fighting and, I fear, in
vain. Kalsus has a dozen men to our one.” He
turned to Hupor and I. “I would take it kindly,
Hupor, and you, Khamersis, if you would fight for
us. Kayana needs every man who can wield a lec,
this day.”
-
-
Chapter Nine
-
-
Haliac’s Loot
-
-
-
We left the tent and, following Luplar,
wended our way toward the upper end of the valley.
From afar we could hear the sound of trumpets as the
men were called to their posts or to their places in
their companies. Luplar was silent for some time,
but presently he spoke, more as if voicing his
thoughts than offering information to us.
-
-
“They outnumber us, more than four to
one,” he said, gloomily. “I had not counted on
treachery such as aided him to find this valley. I
see little hope for us now, my friends, save to
fight to the last. If we could have had a few more
days, we might have affected a contact with General
Stranon, and then we could have opposed them with
some hope of success. As it is…”
-
-
He ended his statement with a
significant shrug. For a moment or two more, he was
silent, then he spoke again.
-
-
“I thought the Fates had smiled on me
when Kayana arrive today,” he mused. “I looked upon
it as a good omen. Yet I wish she had stayed away a
day or two more. I fear his is the worst place in
the world for her, right now.”
-
-
“This General Stranon,” I put in. “Has
he a force sufficient to oppose Kalsus?”
-
-
“Hardly that,” Luplar answered. “But he
would have enough to protect Kayana for awhile,
could we but get her to him. And, in time, I might
be able to stir the people to rebellion. But our
position is hopeless. There is no way out of the
valley. The men of Kalsus have undoubtedly blocked
all the exits.”
-
-
“Have you forgotten the thurwani?” I
asked. “Both you and the lady may escape on them.”
-
-
The priest’s face lighted up at once.
-
-
“The very thing!” he cried delightedly.
“You have saved our Lady, Khamersis. And perhaps
you have saved the country, too, and all its noble
traditions. For if ever Renthapes of Phend became
our king, ‘twould not be long ere Mizmar became a
mere satrapy of that northern nation.”
-
-
He turned around and started back to the
camp, motioning us to follow. Once there, he began
to issue orders at once. A guard was dispatched to
bring Pharops and Haliac and the others; a commander
was appointed in Luplar’s lace with instructions to
surrender rather than cause useless bloodshed, once
we had left the valley, and then we, too, left the
tent and started to the place where the thurwani
were stabled.
-
-
We walked down the trail, through a
group of tents and off into a thicket. We walked in
darkness, for night had come on and we dared no not
use a light, with our enemies somewhere in the
valley, seeking us. We came upon a group suddenly,
we heard a muttered challenge, but it only turned
out to be Pharops and Haliac and their companions.
Together, we all continued our way, and came at last
to the place where the beasts were tethered.
-
-
“There is need for speed,” Luplar told
us when we were gathered together at the picket
line. “I would be glad indeed to wait for morning,
before taking our lady up into the sky. But there
is no telling when Kalsus will strike, and he might
seize this place before we could make use of the
animals. So, if I might advise you, Lady Kayana, I
would say, go even now.”
-
-
Kayana turned to me. Luplar’s advice is
good, is it not, Khamersis, my friend?”
-
-
I shrugged, a bit fatalistically, I
fear. “We have almost no choice, Kayana,” I
answered. Kalsus has us surrounded, I understand.
He will certainly take us tomorrow…”
-
-
“Nay, he will take you tonight!”
-
-
A voice had come astonishingly out of
the shadows behind us, a sardonic, chuckling voice
that was accompanied at once by the forms of a dozen
or more of Kalsus’ soldiers. My hand flew to my
lec, but with a sudden rush, several of the soldiers
seized the form of the princess and, lecs held high,
threatened her.
-
-
“Don’t be such a fool as to attempt to
fight,” warned the officer who appeared to be in
charge. “This place was taken hours ago and you are
well surrounded. It was only by a trick that you
were permitted to come as far as you have.”
-
-
He laughed again and commanded his men
to disarm us. My arm was itching to bury my lec in
his ugly face, but the two soldiers still threatened
Kayana, and I saw in her eyes an appeal to desist.
So I meekly let myself be disarmed, as did Hupor and
Haliac and all the others.
-
-
Hupor, I think, took our capture in
worse manner than any of us. He hesitated when one
of the soldiers held his hand out for his lec, and I
really think he considered the advisability of
seizing the weapon and dying, right there, in a
fight. But Kayana murmured: “Remember, ghanvarrek,
I will need ever man before this is through.” So he
reluctantly handed over his weapon and we all stood
disarmed, prisoners of our enemies.
-
-
I would like to skip over, as quickly as
possible, the events of the next few days. We were
taken to the enemy camp and lodged in a big tent - -
that is, the men were. Kayana was taken at once to
Mizrend, or so we were told, to be interviewed by
Kalsus. Kalsus, apparently, was not with the troops
who were fighting for him, here in the mountains.
-
-
At the evening of the next day, word
came that Luplar’s men, leaderless had scattered
into the hills and that many of them had escaped
capture. Yet, all resistance was over, and so
Kalsus’ victorious army began its march back to
Mizrend, taking us as prisoners with it. With a
sarcastic insolence that reminded me of certain
nations of my own world, Kalsus had charged us with
treason to Mizmar and to Mizmar’s queen!
-
-
We entered the city of Mizrend on the
afternoon of the third day after we had been
captured. The city was typical barbaric town to my
earthly eyes, with great walls surrounding it and a
palace and a temple that outshone all the other
buildings within the walls. The home of the common
people were rather simple huts or, at the most,
cottages of sundried bricks of mud; and there seemed
to be as many of these outside the walls as within.
The inhabitants, as always, seemed to be on the side
of the winner, and cheered themselves hoarse as
Kalsus’ army rode through the streets with us a
their prisoners.
-
-
We were taken to the palace, but there
was little honor in the fact, for, in spite of the
fact that political prisoners were usually treated
with some consideration, the embittered Kalsus
ignore the usual rules of the game and cast us into
a large dungeon in the lower part of the building.
-
-
The place was naked of furniture except
for a half dozen or so of cots, and it as plain that
several of us were going to have to sleep on the
floor. I glanced about at our group and found that
it consisted of Luplar, Hupor and I, Pharops and
Haliac and two of the original seamen of Hupor’s
crew two rowers called Bran and Conoc. I caught
Hupor’s eye - - he had seen me looking over the
sadly depleted numbers of our group - - and he shook
his head sadly. “It will really be a miracle if we
ever get out of the predicament we’re now in,” he
said with a grim half-smile.
-
-
For over an hour, we sat, reproaching
ourselves for getting into the fix in which we found
ourselves and thrashing over absurd plans for
getting out of it. At last, after we had been
allowed a rather frugal supper, Haliac came to me
and, drawing me aside, said, hesitantly:
-
-
“Khamersis, I have ever been a poor man
and a follower, and when a chance came to know
luxury and wealth, I took it and have since
selfishly kept it to myself. I had hoped that
Kayana might win back her throne and reward you and
my other friends fittingly, so that I might, with a
free conscience, keep what I have for my own. But
now…”
-
-
He hesitated awkwardly. “What in the
world are you driving at?” I asked.
-
-
He reached into his sweater, fished
around as if pulling something out of his belt,
saying as he did so, “Khamersis, I had hoped, as I
said, to gain wealth from the sale of this. But
perhaps it will ransom us from this prison, and if
it does, Haliac will consider his fortune
well-spent.”
-
-
He had drawn the object forth by this
time. I saw something of leather and wire,
something with red and blue jewels sewed into it,
vaguely familiar - -
-
-
“The crown of might!” I ejaculated,
suddenly recognizing the article.
-
-
Haliac grinned with pleasure.
-
-
“I picked it up as soon as you knocked
it off the Hsoli’s head,” he said, chuckling. “I
wonder that there wasn’t a general rush for it.
Strange indeed it was that the wonder and fear of
the lizard-men should make so many of Hupor’s
pirates forget all their training.”
-
-
He handed me the crown, continuing as he
did so, “Surely, Khamersis, that crown ought to
purchase the freedom of several of us, and thus give
us all a chance.”
-
-
I took the headgear and looked at it
curiously. It was indeed a strange article, and it
took little examination to make me realize that here
was an intricate instrument made by a weird science
that may have been, nay, probably had been, greater
than the science of my own world.
-
-
The complexity of the wiring and the
curious arrangement of those wires around the
jewels, which, I now began to suspect, were not
jewels at all, but some sort of vacuum tubes, made
me feel that the thing as not unlike a radio. But,
although I am not altogether ignorant of radio, I
could make nothing of the thing.
-
-
Idly, I shook out the folds of the cloth
and slipped the thing on my head. It hung down low,
for the head of the Hsoli chief had been bigger than
mine. I felt for the two dials that were set in the
cap over my eyes and turned the a little - -
-
-
The dim scene in the prison cell was
wiped out in a blaze of light! Sharp and clear
before me, so sharp and clear indeed that I
involuntarily cried out as the light struck my eyes,
was a scene of a tropical valley. I was looking at
the valley in which the town of the Hsoli lay, and,
if I was not mistaken, I was looking at it through
Hsoli eyes.
-
-
At my cry, Haliac had stepped forward
concernedly, and when he saw me staring wildly at
some vision which was, of course, totally invisible
to him, he became frightened and tore the crown from
my head and hurled it to the floor. I stared about
dazedly for a second or two and then laughed, a
little uncertainly.
-
-
Haliac shook his head. “I saw nothing
strange except your actions, Khamersis,” he told
me. “You looked as if you were bewitched or were
seeing a ghost.”
-
-
“I was seeing something mighty strange,”
said I. “I had a vision of the isle of the Hsoli,
and I could see the streets of the village as
plainly as I see you. Far plainer…” I amended, as I
thought of the brilliance of the scene which I had
witnessed.
-
-
Haliac looked at the crown with a sort
of disgust. “Perhaps we could at least cut off the
jewels and trade them for our freedom,” he
suggested.
-
-
“I don’t think they’re even jewels,” I
said dishearteningly. “I’m afraid the crown ill
prove to have but little money value, Haliac, my
friend.”
-
-
He looked disappointed, but just then an
idea came to me, a puzzling, incredible idea that
almost stunned me in its magnitude. I stooped over
and picked up the crown of might and clapped it on
my head. Haliac looked anxious and started to
object, but I waved him away and fitted the cap to
my brow.
-
-
No sooner was it well down on my temples
than the vision of the island returned. I could
hear Haliac’s voice, but any sight of him or of the
prison cell was gone entirely.
-
-
“What has come over you, Khamersis?” my
companion was crying anxiously. “You are staring
again, as though you were seeing some vision of
enchantment.” I waved a silencing arm in the
general direction from which his voice seemed to
come. “Be quiet,” I said. “I am seeing a
vision, a vision of the isle of the Hsoli, and of
the people of that island.”
-
-
“You mean you can see them, just as if
you were there?”
-
-
“That’s right, Haliac. And if I can see
them for the reason that I think, perhaps I have a
plan that will save us all.”
-
-
As I spoke I had been looking about me,
and now, some little distance away, I saw one of the
Hsoli whom I thought I recognized as being one of
those guards who had led us through the forest when
we were first captured. I decided that he was good
a one as any to try my experiment on; so I mentally
sent a command to him to draw nearer so that I might
look him over a little more carefully.
-
-
The fellow had been seated by a rotting
log, dully tearing it apart with his strong claws.
He was quite evidently searching for insects and
grubs, apparently without enough intelligence to
search for any better food. But at my command, his
head raised, he leaped to his feet, saluted, and I
hear a joyous mental cry of “Hail, Master!”
And instantly he came forward and stood directly
before my field of vision.
-
-
I tore the cap from my head and whooped
with joy. The experiment had worked. I had given a
command to Hsoli, and he had obeyed. Yes, in spite
of the fact that several hundred miles of desert,
sea and mountain intervened, the Hsoli had obeyed my
bidding, and gladly. I whooped again.
-
-
Haliac was watching me, anxiously.
Luplar and Hupor and the others, attracted by my
strange actions, crowded around me. It looked as if
they were uncertain as to whether I was responsible
for my actions or not, so I hastened to reassure
them.
-
-
“The wearer of the crown of might is
still the master of the Hsoli,” I shouted joyously.
And what we have done once, we can do again. And
what we have done once, we can do again. And what
is Kalsus going to say, when an army of hundreds of
Hsoli sweep down on him from the sky, mounted on
their thurwani?”
-
-
-
Chapter Ten
-
-
The Battle of Mizrend
-
-
It was hours later. I was
seated stiffly on one of our cots, and I suppose
anyone looking at me might have thought I was in
some weird sort of trance. Hupor sat on one side of
me and Haliac on the other, and Pharops and Luplar,
with the seamen, paced anxiously about the cell,
waiting an occasional word I gave them the results
of my commands to the Hsoli.
-
-
I had been directing the lives of these
lizard-men for nearly eight hours. They obeyed me
so implicitly and so eagerly in everything that
already I was beginning to feel that these creatures
were but tools in my hands, indeed it was hard to
keep from thinking of them as extensions of my very
body.
-
-
They had assembled in the village
square; they had brought out all of their many
thurwani; with joyous squawks of happiness they had
mounted the creatures and taken to the air.
According to reports which came to me mentally from
certain of them, I was aware that there was a little
over twelve hundred of them in the group which
finally took off from the island. Among this group,
I was surprised to find a large number of females,
in fact, it seemed that there was little distinction
made between the sexes when it came to fighting or
working.
-
-
Haliac coughed apologetically, beside
me. “Have you sighted land yet, Khamersis?” he
asked.
-
-
“Not yet,” I answered, a bit testily.
Already, he and Hupor had asked this question at
least a half a dozen times. “I’ll tell you when I
see it. It oughtn’t to be long now.”
-
-
Even as I spoke, my straining eyes - -
strange to think that those eyes which strained were
not my eyes - - my straining eyes
beheld a dark line on the horizon and knew that at
last the Hsoli were approaching the continent.
-
-
“There’s the land at last,” I cried, and
I heard a stifled cheer from my comrades. Mentally,
I gave the command to the Hsoli to ride to that land
and to alight on the beach and spend the night
there. Then, with a fatigue that seemed strange
when you reflect that all I had done all day was to
sit in my cell and give commands, I tore off the
crown of might and stretched out on a bunk to rest.
-
-
It was but a short time later that one
of the jailor’s helpers entered with our food. This
fellow had fed us before and we had found him a
genial sort of a chap, though none too bright. He
had seemed willing enough to talk, and had even
vouchsafed some information as to what was going on
outside. So now we deluged him with questions as to
the latest reports on the progress of events. And,
of course, Luplar and Hupor and I were most
interested in the whereabouts and the condition of
Kayana.
-
-
“What new of the outside this time,
Letho?” Luplar asked the question in a sort of
wheedling manner that he had already found to be
most effective when talking to the fellow. “Has the
rebellion been broken entirely, since our capture?”
-
-
Letho chuckled. “They say General
Stranon still carries on a guerilla campaign in the
south,” he replied. “But he fights no more for
Kayana, of course, but only to save his own neck.
Since the Lady Kayana returned to Mizrend, there is
no more stomach for fight among your rebel friends.”
-
-
“And Kalsus?” Luplar pursued with a
faint smile. “Has he gone south to break Stranon’s
resistance?”
-
-
Letho scowled. “Kalsus remains in
Mizrend. He has sent another to fight Stranon.”
-
-
Luplar laughed. “He sent another to
fight me, too, didn’t he? I fear you master is
somewhat of a coward, Letho.”
-
-
Letho shrugged. “Coward or no, the
Kiphoram has appointed him chancellor,” he said,
“and as such I must serve him. But I long for the
days when Kayana’s father ruled and a man was at the
head of the state. One might know what would
transpire from day to day, then.”
-
-
He sighed. Luplar gave us a knowing
glance and pursued his interrogations. What excuse
does Kalsus give, that he must stay in the city when
an enemy is opposing him in the south?” he asked.
-
-
“Oh, his excuse is good enough. He says
that Renthapes of Phend has left his homeland and is
on his way to Mizrend to wed the Lady Kayana, and to
untie the two countries. And he must be in Mizrend
when he arrives, to welcome him properly.”
-
-
Hupor whistled. Haliac and the seamen
turned suddenly and gave their attention to the
conversation. Luplar looked more concerned than I
had seen him look since our capture. He pressed
Letho for further details.
-
-
“Kalsus has made the announcement to the
people that the plans were for the Lord of Phend to
leave Trecarnis a month or so ago, and to arrive in
his vessel shortly. He has assured the people that
as soon as the Phendine king has married Kayana,
that a man will be at the head of the state, and
that a stable government will follow at once.”
-
-
“And how do the people take this
announcement, Letho? Do they so easily forget the
glorious Vekkan dynasty, and all that it has done
for them?”
-
-
Letho looked at him a little oddly. He
glanced at the door and out into the hall, to make
sure that no outsiders might hear his answer.
-
-
“They submit, outwardly, at least,” he
answered. “But there are many who only await a
leader to break out in rebellion, I think. Now that
the Lady’s army is defeated, they know that the one
hope of a settlement without their participation is
ended. And I think it would take little now to
persuade the people to rise up, themselves.” He
shook his head. “This is treason, I know, but it
may be called patriotism in a few weeks.”
-
-
Luplar gave him a hearty slap on the
back.
-
-
“Thank you, Letho. Get you out of here,
now. And if ever the Lady Kayana regains her right,
you will not be forgotten.”
-
-
Letho’s serious look broke into a grin
and he bowed before the priest and left the cell.
-
-
Hupor and I at once went into a session
with Luplar. For an hour we planned and talked
concerning the method of attach which would be most
efficacious on the morrow. We discussed also
Renthapes of Phend and what his coming might do to
us. Was he bringing a fleet, or transports of
soldiers, or was he coming alone, trusting to Kalsus
and his treason to turn the country over to him when
he arrived?
-
-
It was late when we finally turned in,
yet I had some little trouble getting to sleep, for
my mind insisted on dwelling on the morrow and in
wondering what that morrow would bring.
-
-
Nest morning we were up with the sun. I
at once donned the crown of might, woke the Hsoli,
and spent a valuable half hour experimenting with
the miraculous a crown. I found the dials on the
front had something to do with the individual
through which the impulses were sent, in fact, I
found that I might look through the eyes of anyone
of the individual Hsoli by a proper adjustment of
those dials. I also found that I had far more
control of the individual to whom my mind was
adjusted than any other.
-
-
Having found out these facts, and being
unable to learn anything else at that time, I
directed the Hsoli to mount and take off in the
direction of Mizrend. Then I sat down to await
their arrival.
-
-
They arrived at about one
o’clock. It was a most propitious hour. The
Mizmari, like many Latin peoples in our world, had
the habit of enjoying a siesta immediately after
lunch, and it was just about the time that the
siesta had started when the lizard-men swooped down
upon the city.
-
-
I had been looking out the window, with
the cap on my head, but not adjusted to connect me
with the creatures, when I saw a tiny black spot
rise over the hills far beyond the city. I called
the attention of both Hupor and Luplar to it, but it
was the keen-eyed ghanvarrek that assured me it
really was the first of the Hsoli. And, in a
moment, the appearance of first one, and then a
dozen and at last hundreds of the specks made me
sure that he was right.
-
-
I hastened to connect the cap and, in
thought at least to take my place among the flying
monsters. So natural was my seeming translation
from the cell to the back of the distant thurwani
that I forgot, almost at once, the fact that I was
incarcerated; and so, acting as leader of the
attacking creatures, I sent them in a great series
of nosedives directly down on the two most important
portions of the city - - the marketplace and the
palace.
-
-
What I have called the palace of Mizrend
must not be confused with a medieval castle, by any
means. Like the great palace of Knossos, in Crete,
or like the old Forbidden City of Peiping, it was a
whole series of structures, of one, two or three
stories, surrounded by or built into a wall of
enormous size and strength which completely enclosed
it.
-
-
There were barracks at one side, where
thousands of soldiers could be, and were, housed;
there were the dwellings of the nobles, who,
although they had villas and castles of their own in
various parts of the kingdom, felt that it was
necessary to have a resident at the capital, too.
And there were the royal apartments and a number of
such important buildings as the astrological
observatory and the state library.
-
-
This “palace” then, as may be seen, was
the real heart of the city of Mizrend. And so it
was toward this heart that I directed my greatest
attack, not only because it was the center of the
city, but because Kalsus was there - - and also
Kayana.
-
-
To picture the confusion that ensued, I
can only offer a parallel in our own world. Imagine
a sudden assault on the capital city of one of the
countries of our world by an army of horned and
hoofed red devils, devils straight out of the
engravings of Durer! The attack on Mizrend by the
believed-to-be imaginary Hsoli, who for centuries
had been as legendary and as absent from reality as
our own monsters of evil, took the fight out of the
average Mizmari before he even had a chance to arm
himself.
-
-
But the nobles of the Kiphoram, and the
soldiers who obeyed them, were not made of the same
pale stuff as the merchants and the artisans. As
the monsters swarmed down on the palace I could see
through Hsoli eyes that there was going to be a
stiff resistance. At least, it was going to be
stiffer than I had expected, and, remember, there
were far more men ready to fight for Kalsus than
there were Hsoli to fight for me. From the first, I
had depended on fright to fight most of my battle
for me.
-
-
To be frank, this attempt at defense
left me a little nonplussed. “They’re going to
fight us if they can,” I whispered to Luplar, who,
though he was invisible to my Hsoli attentive eyes,
was, I knew, sitting beside me in the cell. “I wish
I could think of some way to avoid a man-to-man
conflict.”
-
-
“Why not give a war-cry for Kayana,” he
suggested. “That ought to raise a little
uncertainty among them.”
-
-
“The very thing,” I cried, and from a
hundred Hsoli throats rose u the cry: “For Kayana,
and death to Kalsus the Coward!”
-
-
Below the circling Hsoli, the soldiers
were pouring from their barracks, buckling on their
armor as they came and swinging their lecs. I could
see their od-helia attempting to form them into
companies and I could see the nobles hurrying from
their side of the palace to take command of them.
Again and again I had the Hsoli repeat the war-cry,
and presently I knew that it was beginning to have
effect.
-
-
I held off the lizard-men, commanding
that they circle the palace again and again at a
height of about forty feet. I kept a sharp eye on
the soldiers and continued my propaganda, abetted by
Luplar. The high priest, of course, was really the
final authority, if not on the Hsoli, at least on
what the legends said, concerning them, and he
instructed me on just what to say and how to say it.
-
-
The result was that before very long the
people began to get the general idea that Kalsus was
so evil that Zebantu had sent the Hsoli to carry him
off without even waiting for him to die. And that
if they didn’t want to be carried off with him, it
behooved them to get right with Zor, Luplar, Kayana
and Company.
-
-
And the, fighting began in the palace.
A whole troop of soldiers suddenly declared against
Kalsus, and started fighting their way to the
gateway in an attempt to get out into the city where
they might join the people. They beat their way to
the gate, aided by constantly growing number of
sympathizers. When they finally reached the gate,
they had to fight a while to win it away from its
defenders, but when they did, they found, without, a
roaring mob of the populace, armed with whatever
they might happen to have, and all shouting demands
that Kalsus deliver Kayana and resign the
Chancellorship.
-
-
I gave an order to the Hsoli to continue
the threatening circling of the palace and took off
the crown for a moment to look around the cell and
smile happily. “It’s only a matter of time,” I
said. More and more of the people and the soldiers
are coming over to our side. Kalsus will surely be
in flight before night.”
-
-
Luplar was about to make some comment
when the cell door opened and Letho walked in. He
was grinning and he had a heavy, old-fashioned lec
in his hand.
-
-
“No need to dissemble any more, now,” he
said. “All the city is taking sides and every man
can fight today with whom he wishes, I’m off to
fight for Kayana and the house Vekka. And I’m
leaving the door open behind me.”
-
-
He winked at us and walked out. At a
nod from Hupor, Haliac and the seamen hurried out
after him and we saw them no more that day. Luplar,
Hupor and I hesitated a moment or two before
following. “It might be best,” I said, “to lead the
hordes of the Hsoli personally. Do you think you
can ride a thurban, Luplar?”
-
-
The priest’s eyes twinkled. “What was
learned so easily by the Lady Kayana should not be
too difficult for me. Lead on, Khamersis. This
seems to be your day of days, and where Zor leads,
‘twere well for his priest to follow.”
-
-
We hurried out of the dungeon,
therefore, and, adjusting the crown of might, I
commanded three of the Hsoli to alight nearby. A
short while later, their mounts arose into the air
with we three humans on their backs.
-
-
We rose high enough to get a general
view of the city, and then, turning our mounts
lower, we studied the numerous little battles that
were taking place in various part of the town and
the palace. The results of this reconnaissance was
that I was able to direct Hsoli detachments to any
place where the battle seemed to be going against
Kayana’s supporters, thus aiding in breaking down
the resistance everywhere.
-
-
It was after we had been in the air for
about two hours that the keen eyes of Hupor pointed
out a company of soldiers leaving the palace by the
western gate. There were several dozen of them, in
exceptionally ornate uniforms, and in the center of
their group, there was an elaborate sedan chair,
covered with curtains and carried on the soldiers of
four servants.
-
-
“If I am not deceived,” the ghanvarrek
said, “we will find the source of all our troubles
in that group. By the beard of Zebantu, Kalsus the
coward is leaving his own men to flee.”
-
-
With a consort of some two dozen Hsoli,
we swooped down in front of the group and challenged
them. The soldiers were almost green with fear when
they saw the Hsoli, but they swung their lecs and
started to fight bravely for the nobles they had
chosen for their masters. Hupor? Luplar and I left
the men fighting with the monsters and, rising on
our thurwani, we swept over their heads, and came
down, lecs swinging, among the group of noblemen
around the sedan.
-
-
The battle was brief and uneventful; had
it been any briefer I should have been forced to
call it a massacre. We knew, however, that now was
no time to soften in the face of our enemies, and so
we sternly annihilated the last of the fighters
around the vehicle. Yet even as we fought them,
Luplar found time to cry: “I see not Kalsus,
Khamersis. Is it possible he is not among them?”
-
-
“He’s in the sedan, of course,” I
answered, and even as I spoke, I leaped from my
mount and advanced on the vehicle grimly. I was
thoroughly decided that this villain must be put
where he could do no more damage to anyone. Though
I had never yet come face to face with him, yet he
had caused so much trouble and sorrow to all who had
befriended me, that I looked upon him as the
greatest of my enemies. And now he was virtually in
my hands. I tore the curtains from the sedan and
called to him to come out.
-
-
There was a whimpering cry of “Save me,
Lady, save me!” Within the sedan was - - Kayana, of
all people. And crouching behind her, with a silk
robe to hide his face, was the arch-villain, Kalsus.
-
-
I was surprised, indeed, to see Kayana
here, but a moment’s thought made me realize that
Kalsus would certainly have taken her with him as a
hostage. Giving but a second’s consideration to
this thought, I turned my mind to more important
things, and, reaching into the sedan, I jerked the
coward cut.
-
-
He gave a cry of fear as he felt my
hands touch him, but disregarding his pleas and
cries, I hauled him forth and stood him on the
ground before me. As I did so, Luplar and Hupor
strode up, their lecs bloody and their features
grim.
-
-
Kalsus’ face was hidden in his hands,
but I tore them away and made him face me. My
intent was to give him a lec to defend himself with,
and then to slay him right there, but I was halted
in my plans by the look of astonishment that covered
his face when he saw me for the first time.
-
-
“You!” he cried, woefully. “You, Lord?”
Oh, what has Kalsus done - - what has Kalsus done,
that you should treat him like this? Have I not
served you faithfully? Hasn’t your word been my law
for years? Why have you turned against your
servant, Lord?”
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I wondered what in the world he was
driving at. I hesitated and turned to Luplar and
Hupor. They had peculiar looks on their faces, and
were staring at me most strangely.
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Kalsus went on: “When did you arrive,
Lord, and why didn’t you let me know? The last
report I heard was when you set sail for Mizrend.”
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I looked about me, growing more and more
confused every second. The strange looks on the
faces of my friends were changing to looks of
anger. I looked at Kayana and she turned her head,
refusing to meet my gaze.
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“Look here!” I cried angrily. “What’s
this all about? Who are you intimating I am,
Kalsus?”
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Kalsus looked hurt. “There is no doubt
who you are, Lord. I have seen you too many times
to be in doubt. You are the Lord of Accala,
King-Emperor of Trecarnis and Protector of the
Isles, Renthapes of Phend!”
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Chapter Eleven
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Climax and Anticlimax
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Of all the amazing events that occurred
to me during my sojourn in that world of amazing
events, this one was certainly the one that
astounded me the most.
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For a second or two, the only emotion I
felt was one of anger at effrontery of Kalsus in
manufacturing such a lie. Then came the realization
that the statement might not be a lie, that there
was a possibility that I really might be
Renthapes of Phend. Had not my fighting been that
of a carefully taught noble? And had not the very
fact that I had first discovered myself as a
castaway been evidence that I had been making some
kind of a sea trip when I was shipwrecked?
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When I realized that the chances that
this body which I inhabited really might be that of
the Phendine king, Renthapes, I was almost dazed at
the implications that arose. Hupor, Luplar and
Kayana were still looking at me with anger and
interrogation on their faces, and I realized that I
would have to do some tall talking to convince them
that I had not been fully conscious of my identity
all along, or, indeed, that I had not assumed the
false identity of “Khamersis” merely to lead them to
destruction.
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So I held up my hands and begged them
not to judge me until they heard me out. I began to
tell my story, the same story I had told to Hupor,
that night upon the ship; but I told it with more
detail this time, and paused often to call their
attention to some incident that seemed to me to
offer some proof that the mind that controlled this
body was really not that of the Phendine king.
When I had finished, Kayana came forward and laid
her hands on my shoulders, looking into my eyes and
saying; “I believed you, Khamersis. Your story
sounds true enough for me.”
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Of course, when she said this, Hupor and
Luplar were forced to accept me too, but they kept
asking me questions, just the same, and I could see,
from the shrewdness of the questions that they had
not yet accepted me, down in their hearts. But at
last, during my description of the world from which
I had came, I saw belief begin to dawn in their
eyes. I think they were convinced that no man of
the Three Countries could possibly conceive in his
imagination the wonders that I told them of.
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So, once again in my comrades’ good
graces, we rounded up what prisoners we had taken,
and, with Kalsus among them, we started back to the
city on foot. The fighting had ended when we got
there, and every here the troops who had rebelled
and spoken for Kayana were successful. When they
saw us coming, from the gateway, the news spread
rapidly through the town and a great spontaneous
celebration began. Troops fell in behind us, hands
of curious musical instruments united and joined the
troops and through crowds of milling thousands, all
cheering themselves hoarse, we made our way to the
palace and to the particular part of the palace that
was reserved for the royal family.
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I was assigned a suite of rooms and a
staff of servants by a spluttering officious
majordomo who suddenly arrived from nowhere and took
charge of the ordering of the palace; my friends
bade me goodbye and departed to apartments that, by
order of Kayana, were assigned to them; and for the
first time since my arrival on this world, I found
myself alone and supplied with comforts. I sank
down on a couch and strove to meditate on my
peculiar position and to wonder what I ought to do
about it.
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Through I had little time or excuse to
tell her, I realized that I was in love with
Kayana. And I was not unaware that she also held
some affection for me. Yet, if I were Renthapes of
Phend, the possibility of the proud daughter of the
Vekkas marring a Phendine king was rather small.
And if I were not Renthapes - - why then I was a
commoner and couldn’t marry her anyhow.
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Also - - if I were Renthapes of Phend,
toward who did my duty lay? Phend, the country of
my body, or Mizmar, the country, I might say, of my
adoption? For surely all my sympathies, since
arriving on this world, as with the southern
country.
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I lay for several hours trying to solve
the mystery, but the closest I had gotten by
suppertime was a decision to allow events to shape
themselves and to abide by the decision of my
friends and the soon-to-be queen of Mizmar.
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The next few days were busy ones, but
the events would not add to this narrative, for they
consisted mostly in cleaning up after the battle. I
held an inspection of the Hsoli in the public square
to show the people that the creatures were in the
hands of their friends, and then ordered the
lizard-men to fly back to their island. I retained
the crown of might, with the intention of using it
now and then to keep the Hsoli fit and in good
health, so that they might be available if I ever
needed them again.
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Luplar doffed his armor and appeared
once more in his sacerdotal robes, but, to me, the
change was an odd one. In spite of the dignity and
calm of the priestly robes, I could not help but
see, beneath them, the twinkling-eyed warrior whom I
had first met in the hills. And Hupor - - Kayana, I
heard, had offered him a high position in the navy
of Mizmar, but he had turned it down, asking only
that she give him a vessel that he might call his
own, and allow him a week to leave the port. He had
many conversations with Haliac and Pharops, and
there was no doubt in my mind that he intended to
return, as soon as the opportunity offered, to his
old trade.
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As for myself, a conversation with
Kayana showed me that she had made up her mind all
about me. I was abandon all claim to the throne
that this body I wore had formerly sat on; I was to
forget entirely that I had any connection with
Renthapes or Phend or any foreign nation. In
return, she would give me the lands and titles that
had been taken from Kalsus, and, as a noble of the
kingdom, I might, some day, claim a place beside
her, as her consort.
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Frankly, this didn’t appeal to my
masculinity a bit. I told her as much, leaning over
her she sat on her chair of state in the big room
where she had given me the honor of a private
conference.
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“I don’t know a whole lot about the
customs of this world,” I told her. “But it seems
as if you are having entirely too much to do about
his romance. After all, a man likes to have
something to say about his own courtship and
marriage. And if someone is going to arrange it for
him, it certainly shouldn’t be the girl he’s going
to marry.”
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“You are not being asked to marry me!”
she flashed, indignantly. “You will have the utmost
freedom of choice. I had been left to understand -
- to understand - -”
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She burst into tears, woman’s eternal
weapon, and, of course, she won, right then. I
leaned over and took her in my arms and kissed her
and begged her pardon. Then, when I had dried her
eyes, she commanded me to kiss her again, and asked
me if I were willing, now to do as she said.
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I couldn’t help objecting. I was
beginning to wonder about Phend and the city of
Trecarnis, and whether I could manage to hold down
the job of king in that country or not. The
proposition was sounding more and more attractive to
me, and I hated the idea of abandoning it just to
satisfy Kayana’s whim.
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So we argued again, and when the
argument was over, we had gotten no place. I bade
her goodbye rather stiffly, and departed for my
suite, where I disrobed and cast myself into bed,
still half-angry with my stubborn princess.
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It must have been still night when I
awoke, for it was quite dark about me. I tried to
move and found to my surprise, and to my
consternation, too, that I was bound hand and foot.
I struggled for a moment, thinking, in my half-awake
state, that I had merely become entangled in the
covers, but a moment convinced me that this was not
so, for my arms were drawn across my chest and bound
to opposite sides of my body and my feet were tight
together.
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I cried out, cried not too loudly at
first, but when my calls attracted no attention, I
roared out more loudly and angrily. At last, after
some ten minutes of bellowing, I heard footsteps
approaching through the dark, and a voice cried
sarcastically: “All right, Renthapes, pipe down.
You don’t want another dose of water, do you?”
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“What am I doing all tied up here?” I
cried. “Untie me, at once.”
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A flashlight flashed suddenly on, and
revealed the fact that the man who had spoken to me
was standing outside of a barred door, and that I
was in a small cell, lying on a cot. The fellow was
grinning and preparing to open the door with a large
key.
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And the fellow was dressed in long pants
and a polo shirt, and had a wrist watch on his arm!
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For a moment, the full significance of
that fact failed to penetrate. Then it struck me.
I was once more upon the earth, and, as near as I
could make out, incarcerated in some jail or
something.
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“Where’s Adrian Channing!” I cried.
“What am I doing in this place? What’s become of
Adrian Channing?”
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“Now take it easy, Renthapes!” the
attendant grinned. “You’ve been off your nut for a
month or so, and Mr. Channing has been trying to
bring you back to sanity. This is the St. Simon
Sanatorium for Mental Patients, and you’ve been
about the toughest patient we’ve had for a good many
months.”
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He looked me over critically, and then
set about removing the straitjacket that had held
me. I sat down on the bed, when he got it off, and
rubbed my numbed wrists. “I wish you’d get Channing
over here, as soon as possible,” I said. He made a
boner when he sent me off on that experiment of
his. And now he’s made another in bringing me
back. I’ve got to have a talk with him at once.”
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The attendant arose. “You talk pretty
sane. You act different than you did since you came
here. I’ll get Channing at once.”
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He left and came back in but a few
moments. “I can’t figure it out,” he said.
“Channing has called you his experiment over since
you came here. And just now he was awake and seemed
to be expecting that I’d be calling him.”
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Well, Channing came and although it was
only shortly after midnight when he arrived, we
talked until morning, and I learned all that had
taken place since I had left my body that I had been
born with.
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Of course while my ego was inhabiting
the body of Renthapes of Phend, that king’s
consciousness had been inhabiting mine. And,
knowing nothing of the whys and wherefores of the
strange translation, he had merely thought himself
bewitched in some strange manner, and had kept
insisting on his identity and had grown exceedingly
violent when Channing had refused to support him in
the style to which he had been accustomed.
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But it was not until he escaped and made
a scene in public that Channing had been forced to
place him in a sanatorium. Then, convinced that I
had somehow exchanged egos with an incarcerated
lunatic, and even now locked up in some asylum, he
began to prepare the machine for my return. But
difficulties arose, difficulties that he was to
discover always arose each time the machine was
used, for each translation caused the breakdown of a
delicate tube that could not be bought but had to be
made by hand.
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So it was over a month before he was
able to reassemble the machine and reverse the
states of the two egos he had transposed. And then,
at that moment of all moments, thinking that he was
doing me a favor, he called me back from the carid
to the world in which I was born.
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I am going back again, of course.
Kayana may have a nature a little too haughty and
imperious, but I do love her, more than I
have ever loved any one on this world. And I have
friends, too, Hupor and Haliac and Luplar. I should
hate to think that I would never see them again.
And then I think of what Renthapes might do, while
he remains there in the palace - -
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Channing is working like mad to complete
the tube necessary to send me once more to carid.
While he works, I worry; or at least I did until he
suggested my writing this story to keep my mind
occupied. But now the story is done, and so is the
tube, and Channing has just told me that he is all
ready to send me once more to the world in which I
encountered the strange adventures I have just
described.
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I suppose that I will have a little
trouble, once I get back to Mizrend. Renthapes has,
almost certainly, made things inconvenient for me,
but I will have plenty of time to regain my
advantages. This time I do not expect to return.
And so to this world, and to you who have read my
story, I say farewell, and to the carid, I can say,
“Here I come.”
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Farewell, readers. If I never return to
earth again - - that’s soon enough.
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The End
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Notes:
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*Page 4 Zor – The religion of these people
which, was as real to them as Mohammedanism is to
its believers, was a dualism which pictured the two
gods, Zor and Zebantu, as fighting an eternal war
for the possession of the world and the people that
inhabited it. They were aided by many lesser gods,
and it is perhaps unnecessary to say that Zor was
the god of good and Zebantu the god of evil.
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