CHAPTER XIV

AT GHEK'S COMMAND

Turan the panthan chafed in his chains. Time dragged; silence and

monotony prolonged minutes into hours. Uncertainty of the fate of the

woman he loved turned each hour into an eternity of hell. He listened

impatiently for the sound of approaching footsteps that he might see

and speak to some living creature and learn, perchance, some word of

Tara of Helium. After torturing hours his ears were rewarded by the

rattle of harness and arms. Men were coming! He waited breathlessly.

Perhaps they were his executioners; but he would welcome them

notwithstanding. He would question them. But if they knew naught of

Tara he would not divulge the location of the hiding place in which he

had left her.

Now they came--a half-dozen warriors and an officer, escorting an

unarmed man; a prisoner, doubtless. Of this Turan was not left long in

doubt, since they brought the newcomer and chained him to an adjoining

ring. Immediately the panthan commenced to question the officer in

charge of the guard.

"Tell me," he demanded, "why I have been made prisoner, and if other

strangers were captured since I entered your city."

"What other prisoners?" asked the officer.

"A woman, and a man with a strange head," replied Turan.

"It is possible," said the officer; "but what were their names?"

"The woman was Tara, Princess of Helium, and the man was Ghek, a

kaldane, of Bantoom."

"These were your friends?" asked the officer.

"Yes," replied Turan.

"It is what I would know," said the officer, and with a curt command to

his men to follow him he turned and left the cell.

"Tell me of them!" cried Turan after him. "Tell me of Tara of Helium!

Is she safe?" but the man did not answer and soon the sound of their

departure died in the distance.

"Tara of Helium was safe, but a short time since," said the prisoner

chained at Turan's side.

The panthan turned toward the speaker, seeing a large man, handsome of

face and with a manner both stately and dignified. "You have seen her?"

he asked. "They captured her then? She is in danger?"

"She is being held in The Towers of Jetan as a prize for the next

games," replied the stranger.

"And who are you?" asked Turan. "And why are you here, a prisoner?"

"I am A-Kor the dwar, keeper of The Towers of Jetan," replied the

other. "I am here because I dared speak the truth of O-Tar the jeddak,

to one of his officers."

"And your punishment?" asked Turan.

"I do not know. O-Tar has not yet spoken. Doubtless the games--perhaps

the full ten, for O-Tar does not love A-Kor, his son."

"You are the jeddak's son?" asked Turan.

"I am the son of O-Tar and of a slave, Haja of Gathol, who was a

princess in her own land."

Turan looked searchingly at the speaker. A son of Haja of Gathol! A son

of his mother's sister, this man, then, was his own cousin. Well did

Gahan remember the mysterious disappearance of the Princess Haja and an

entire utan of her personal troops. She had been upon a visit far from

the city of Gathol and returning home had vanished with her whole

escort from the sight of man. So this was the secret of the seeming

mystery? Doubtless it explained many other similar disappearances that

extended nearly as far back as the history of Gathol. Turan scrutinized

his companion, discovering many evidences of resemblance to his

mother's people. A-Kor might have been ten years younger than he, but

such differences in age are scarce accounted among a people who seldom

or never age outwardly after maturity and whose span of life may be a

thousand years.

"And where lies Gathol?" asked Turan.

"Almost due east of Manator," replied A-Kor.

"And how far?"

"Some twenty-one degrees it is from the city of Manator to the city of

Gathol," replied A-Kor; "but little more than ten degrees between the

boundaries of the two countries. Between them, though, there lies a

country of torn rocks and yawning chasms."

Well did Gahan know this country that bordered his upon the west--even

the ships of the air avoided it because of the treacherous currents

that rose from the deep chasms, and the almost total absence of safe

landings. He knew now where Manator lay and for the first time in long

weeks the way to his own Gathol, and here was a man, a fellow prisoner,

in whose veins flowed the blood of his own ancestors--a man who knew

Manator; its people, its customs and the country surrounding it--one

who could aid him, with advice at least, to find a plan for the rescue

of Tara of Helium and for escape. But would A-Kor--could he dare broach

the subject? He could do no less than try.

"And O-Tar you think will sentence you to death?" he asked; "and why?"

"He would like to," replied A-Kor, "for the people chafe beneath his

iron hand and their loyalty is but the loyalty of a people to the long

line of illustrious jeddaks from which he has sprung. He is a jealous

man and has found the means of disposing of most of those whose blood

might entitle them to a claim upon the throne, and whose place in the

affections of the people endowed them with any political significance.

The fact that I was the son of a slave relegated me to a position of

minor importance in the consideration of O-Tar, yet I am still the son

of a jeddak and might sit upon the throne of Manator with as perfect

congruity as O-Tar himself. Combined with this is the fact that of

recent years the people, and especially many of the younger warriors,

have evinced a growing affection for me, which I attribute to certain

virtues of character and training derived from my mother, but which

O-Tar assumes to be the result of an ambition upon my part to occupy

the throne of Manator.

"And now, I am firmly convinced, he has seized upon my criticism of his

treatment of the slave girl Tara as a pretext for ridding himself of

me."

"But if you could escape and reach Gathol," suggested Turan.

"I have thought of that," mused A-Kor; "but how much better off would I

be? In the eyes of the Gatholians I would be, not a Gatholian; but a

stranger and doubtless they would accord me the same treatment that we

of Manator accord strangers."

"Could you convince them that you are the son of the Princess Haja your

welcome would be assured," said Turan; "while on the other hand you

could purchase your freedom and citizenship with a brief period of

labor in the diamond mines."

"How know you all these things?" asked A-Kor. "I thought you were from

Helium."

"I am a panthan," replied Turan, "and I have served many countries,

among them Gathol."

"It is what the slaves from Gathol have told me," said A-Kor,

thoughtfully, "and my mother, before O-Tar sent her to live at Manatos.

I think he must have feared her power and influence among the slaves

from Gathol and their descendants, who number perhaps a million people

throughout the land of Manator."

"Are these slaves organized?" asked Turan.

A-Kor looked straight into the eyes of the panthan for a long moment

before he replied. "You are a man of honor," he said; "I read it in

your face, and I am seldom mistaken in my estimate of a man; but--" and

he leaned closer to the other--"even the walls have ears," he

whispered, and Turan's question was answered.

It was later in the evening that warriors came and unlocked the fetter

from Turan's ankle and led him away to appear before O-Tar, the jeddak.

They conducted him toward the palace along narrow, winding streets and

broad avenues; but always from the balconies there looked down upon

them in endless ranks the silent people of the city. The palace itself

was filled with life and activity. Mounted warriors galloped through

the corridors and up and down the runways connecting adjacent floors.

It seemed that no one walked within the palace other than a few slaves.

Squealing, fighting thoats were stabled in magnificent halls while

their riders, if not upon some duty of the palace, played at jetan with

small figures carved from wood.

Turan noted the magnificence of the interior architecture of the

palace, the lavish expenditure of precious jewels and metals, the

gorgeous mural decorations which depicted almost exclusively martial

scenes, and principally duels which seemed to be fought upon jetan

boards of heroic size. The capitals of many of the columns supporting

the ceilings of the corridors and chambers through which they passed

were wrought into formal likenesses of jetan pieces--everywhere there

seemed a suggestion of the game. Along the same path that Tara of

Helium had been led Turan was conducted toward the throne room of O-Tar

the jeddak, and when he entered the Hall of Chiefs his interest turned

to wonder and admiration as he viewed the ranks of statuesque thoatmen

decked in their gorgeous, martial panoply. Never, he thought, had he

seen upon Barsoom more soldierly figures or thoats so perfectly trained

to perfection of immobility as these. Not a muscle quivered, not a tail

lashed, and the riders were as motionless as their mounts--each warlike

eye straight to the front, the great spears inclined at the same angle.

It was a picture to fill the breast of a fighting man with awe and

reverence. Nor did it fail in its effect upon Turan as they conducted

him the length of the chamber, where he waited before great doors until

he should be summoned into the presence of the ruler of Manator.

* * * * *

When Tara of Helium was ushered into the throne room of O-Tar she found

the great hall filled with the chiefs and officers of O-Tar and U-Thor,

the latter occupying the place of honor at the foot of the throne, as

was his due. The girl was conducted to the foot of the aisle and halted

before the jeddak, who looked down upon her from his high throne with

scowling brows and fierce, cruel eyes.

"The laws of Manator are just," said O-Tar, addressing her; "thus is it

that you have been summoned here again to be judged by the highest

authority of Manator. Word has reached me that you are suspected of

being a Corphal. What word have you to say in refutation of the charge?"

Tara of Helium could scarce restrain a sneer as she answered the

ridiculous accusation of witchcraft. "So ancient is the culture of my

people," she said, "that authentic history reveals no defense for that

which we know existed only in the ignorant and superstitious minds of

the most primitive peoples of the past. To those who are yet so

untutored as to believe in the existence of Corphals, there can be no

argument that will convince them of their error--only long ages of

refinement and culture can accomplish their release from the bondage of

ignorance. I have spoken."

"Yet you do not deny the accusation," said O-Tar.

"It is not worthy the dignity of a denial," she responded haughtily.

"And I were you, woman," said a deep voice at her side, "I should,

nevertheless, deny it."

Tara of Helium turned to see the eyes of U-Thor, the great jed of

Manatos, upon her. Brave eyes they were, but neither cold nor cruel.

O-Tar rapped impatiently upon the arm of his throne. "U-Thor forgets,"

he cried, "that O-Tar is the jeddak."

"U-Thor remembers," replied the jed of Manatos, "that the laws of

Manator permit any who may be accused to have advice and counsel before

their judge."

Tara of Helium saw that for some reason this man would have assisted

her, and so she acted upon his advice.

"I deny the charge," she said, "I am no Corphal."

"Of that we shall learn," snapped O-Tar. "U-Dor, where are those who

have knowledge of the powers of this woman?"

And U-Dor brought several who recounted the little that was known of

the disappearance of E-Med, and others who told of the capture of Ghek

and Tara, suggesting by deduction that having been found together they

had sufficient in common to make it reasonably certain that one was as

bad as the other, and that, therefore, it remained but to convict one

of them of Corphalism to make certain the guilt of both. And then O-Tar

called for Ghek, and immediately the hideous kaldane was dragged before

him by warriors who could not conceal the fear in which they held this

creature.

"And you!" said O-Tar in cold accusing tones. "Already have I been told

enough of you to warrant me in passing through your heart the jeddak's

steel--of how you stole the brains from the warrior U-Van so that he

thought he saw your headless body still endowed with life; of how you

caused another to believe that you had escaped, making him to see

naught but an empty bench and a blank wall where you had been."

"Ah, O-Tar, but that is as nothing!" cried a young padwar who had come

in command of the escort that brought Ghek. "The thing which he did to

I-Zav, here, would prove his guilt alone."

"What did he to the warrior I-Zav?" demanded O-Tar. "Let I-Zav speak!"

The warrior I-Zav, a great fellow of bulging muscles and thick neck,

advanced to the foot of the throne. He was pale and still trembling

visibly as from a nervous shock.

"Let my first ancestor be my witness, O-Tar, that I speak the truth,"

he began. "I was left to guard this creature, who sat upon a bench,

shackled to the wall. I stood by the open doorway at the opposite side

of the chamber. He could not reach me, yet, O-Tar, may Iss engulf me if

he did not drag me to him helpless as an unhatched egg. He dragged me

to him, greatest of jeddaks, with his eyes! With his eyes he seized

upon my eyes and dragged me to him and he made me lay my swords and

dagger upon the table and back off into a corner, and still keeping his

eyes upon my eyes his head quitted his body and crawling upon six short

legs it descended to the floor and backed part way into the hole of an

ulsio, but not so far that the eyes were not still upon me and then it

returned with the key to its fetter and after resuming its place upon

its own shoulders it unlocked the fetter and again dragged me across

the room and made me to sit upon the bench where it had been and there

it fastened the fetter about my ankle, and I could do naught for the

power of its eyes and the fact that it wore my two swords and my

dagger. And then the head disappeared down the hole of the ulsio with

the key, and when it returned, it resumed its body and stood guard over

me at the doorway until the padwar came to fetch it hither."

"It is enough!" said O-Tar, sternly. "Both shall receive the jeddak's

steel," and rising from his throne he drew his long sword and descended

the marble steps toward them, while two brawny warriors seized Tara by

either arm and two seized Ghek, holding them facing the naked blade of

the jeddak.

"Hold, just O-Tar!" cried U-Dor. "There be yet another to be judged.

Let us confront him who calls himself Turan with these his fellows

before they die."

"Good!" exclaimed O-Tar, pausing half way down the steps. "Fetch Turan,

the slave!"

When Turan had been brought into the chamber he was placed a little to

Tara's left and a step nearer the throne. O-Tar eyed him menacingly.

"You are Turan," he asked, "friend and companion of these?"

The panthan was about to reply when Tara of Helium spoke. "I know not

this fellow," she said. "Who dares say that he be a friend and

companion of the Princess Tara of Helium?"

Turan and Ghek looked at her in surprise, but at Turan she did not

look, and to Ghek she passed a quick glance of warning, as to say:

"Hold thy peace."

The panthan tried not to fathom her purpose for the head is useless

when the heart usurps its functions, and Turan knew only that the woman

he loved had denied him, and though he tried not even to think it his

foolish heart urged but a single explanation--that she refused to

recognize him lest she be involved in his difficulties.

O-Tar looked first at one and then at another of them; but none of them

spoke.

"Were they not captured together?" he asked of U-Dor.

"No," replied the dwar. "He who is called Turan was found seeking

entrance to the city and was enticed to the pits. The following morning

I discovered the other two upon the hill beyond The Gate of Enemies."

"But they are friends and companions," said a young padwar, "for this

Turan inquired of me concerning these two, calling them by name and

saying that they were his friends."

"It is enough," stated O-Tar, "all three shall die," and he took

another step downward from the throne.

"For what shall we die?" asked Ghek. "Your people prate of the just

laws of Manator, and yet you would slay three strangers without telling

them of what crime they are accused."

"He is right," said a deep voice. It was the voice of U-Thor, the great

jed of Manatos. O-Tar looked at him and scowled; but there came voices

from other portions of the chamber seconding the demand for justice.

"Then know, though you shall die anyway," cried O-Tar, "that all three

are convicted of Corphalism and that as only a jeddak may slay such as

you in safety you are about to be honored with the steel of O-Tar."

"Fool!" cried Turan. "Know you not that in the veins of this woman

flows the blood of ten thousand jeddaks--that greater than yours is her

power in her own land? She is Tara, Princess of Helium,

great-granddaughter of Tardos Mors, daughter of John Carter, Warlord of

Barsoom. She cannot be a Corphal. Nor is this creature Ghek, nor am I.

And you would know more, I can prove my right to be heard and to be

believed if I may have word with the Princess Haja of Gathol, whose son

is my fellow prisoner in the pits of O-Tar, his father."

At this U-Thor rose to his feet and faced O-Tar. "What means this?" he

asked. "Speaks the man the truth? Is the son of Haja a prisoner in thy

pits, O-Tar?"

"And what is it to the jed of Manatos who be the prisoners in the pits

of his jeddak?" demanded O-Tar, angrily.

"It is this to the jed of Manatos," replied U-Thor in a voice so low as

to be scarce more than a whisper and yet that was heard the whole

length and breadth of the great throne room of O-Tar, Jeddak of

Manator. "You gave me a slave woman, Haja, who had been a princess in

Gathol, because you feared her influence among the slaves from Gathol.

I have made of her a free woman, and I have married her and made her

thus a princess of Manatos. Her son is my son, O-Tar, and though thou

be my jeddak, I say to you that for any harm that befalls A-Kor you

shall answer to U-Thor of Manatos."

O-Tar looked long at U-Thor, but he made no reply. Then he turned again

to Turan. "If one be a Corphal," he said, "then all of you be Corphals,

and we know well from the things that this creature has done," he

pointed at Ghek, "that he is a Corphal, for no mortal has such powers

as he. And as you are all Corphals you must all die." He took another

step downward, when Ghek spoke.

"These two have no such powers as I," he said. "They are but ordinary,

brainless things such as yourself. I have done all the things that your

poor, ignorant warriors have told you; but this only demonstrates that

I am of a higher order than yourselves, as is indeed the fact. I am a

kaldane, not a Corphal. There is nothing supernatural or mysterious

about me, other than that to the ignorant all things which they cannot

understand are mysterious. Easily might I have eluded your warriors and

escaped your pits; but I remained in the hope that I might help these

two foolish creatures who have not the brains to escape without help.

They befriended me and saved my life. I owe them this debt. Do not slay

them--they are harmless. Slay me if you will. I offer my life if it

will appease your ignorant wrath. I cannot return to Bantoom and so I

might as well die, for there is no pleasure in intercourse with the

feeble intellects that cumber the face of the world outside the valley

of Bantoom."

"Hideous egotist," said O-Tar, "prepare to die and assume not to

dictate to O-Tar the jeddak. He has passed sentence and all three of

you shall feel the jeddak's naked steel. I have spoken!"

He took another step downward and then a strange thing happened. He

paused, his eyes fixed upon the eyes of Ghek. His sword slipped from

nerveless fingers, and still he stood there swaying forward and back. A

jed rose to rush to his side; but Ghek stopped him with a word.

"Wait!" he cried. "The life of your jeddak is in my hands. You believe

me a Corphal and so you believe, too, that only the sword of a jeddak

may slay me, therefore your blades are useless against me. Offer harm

to any one of us, or seek to approach your jeddak until I have spoken,

and he shall sink lifeless to the marble. Release the two prisoners and

let them come to my side--I would speak to them, privately. Quick! do

as I say; I would as lief as not slay O-Tar. I but let him live that I

may gain freedom for my friends--obstruct me and he dies."

The guards fell back, releasing Tara and Turan, who came close to

Ghek's side.

"Do as I tell you and do it quickly," whispered the kaldane. "I cannot

hold this fellow long, nor could I kill him thus. There are many minds

working against mine and presently mine will tire and O-Tar will be

himself again. You must make the best of your opportunity while you

may. Behind the arras that you see hanging in the rear of the throne

above you is a secret opening. From it a corridor leads to the pits of

the palace, where there are storerooms containing food and drink. Few

people go there. From these pits lead others to all parts of the city.

Follow one that runs due west and it will bring you to The Gate of

Enemies. The rest will then lie with you. I can do no more; hurry

before my waning powers fail me--I am not as Luud, who was a king. He

could have held this creature forever. Make haste! Go!"