The Zanthodon MEGAPACK ™: The Complete 5-Book Series (40 page)

It would seem from this that the Cro-Magnons were not ignorant of the methods employed by their distant cousins, the Neanderthals, to fashion crude dugout canoes. Although their own home, Thandar, lay inland far from the seacoast, and its rivers were small and few, it would seem that the Cro-Magnons were keenly observant, for they had deduced the methods used by the Apemen of Kor from a mere glimpse or two at their dugouts.

All of this took longer in the doing than in the telling, of course, as is the way with writing. But in time a fleet of crude but serviceable dugouts was prepared in sufficient numbers to carry the entire host of the Thandarians. Once the trees were felled, and while the women and children and oldsters were burning them hollow with heaped coals, the warriors and huntsmen prepared rude paddles. Fortunately, a stand of Jurassic bamboolike treeferns grew near the edges of the grove, and these made excellent paddles.

Once launched upon the waves, the canoe fleet began negotiating the waters along the coast. Their craft were sluggish and unpredictable, lacking such stabilizing elements as rudders or outriggers, but sail they could and sail they did.

North, ever north, they guided the clumsy fleet.

Somewhere in the northern sea lay El-Cazar, the island stronghold of the Barbary Pirates.

And there they would find Darya, if anywhere.…

* * * *

Perspiration glistened on Achmed’s shaven brow and dripped from the edges of his beard as he guided his men with a steady hand.

“Now!” he boomed.

The great catapult soared into the air with a
whump!
, hurling its burden, a heavy and jagged boulder of flinty stone, with terrific velocity.

The missile whistled through the air and struck the monstrous yith at the base of the neck, just above the shoulder. The impact was staggering: the whole ship shuddered to the blow.

The plesiosaur released its victim in order to give voice to a shrill screech of pain. From the way it flopped ungainly, huge paddle-like flippers churning the slimy waves into froth, Achmed guessed that the impact of the flung boulder had either broken the yith’s shoulder—if yiths
had
shoulders, that is!—or had dislocated whatever it was they possessed in place of shoulders.

As a matter of fact, the impact had broken the long spine of the monster. Releasing its hold upon the ship, and screaming all the while in mingled pain, outrage and frustration, the huge serpentlike thing sank sideways into the churning waves, its long tail whipping the water madly.

Then it sank from view and the corsairs breathed easier again. Easy enough, in fact, to raise a cheer for their first mate. But Achmed had no ears for their cheering now.

He sprang across the deck to where his prince lay in a pool of blood and knelt to swiftly examine, with hands that shook only a little, the terrible wounds inflicted by the fangs of the yith.

The muscles of the upper arm and perhaps the shoulder seemed to have been cleanly severed, but they would mend with time and care. The immediate danger was that Kâiradine Redbeard would bleed to death, for great arteries were punctured. Scarlet fountains arced in the misty air, and the face of the unconscious Redbeard was pale as wax.

Hastily the Barbary Pirates came to the aid of their chief. Salt water cleansed the ghastly wounds, and the mangled arm was tightly bound with clean bandages and splinted with belaying pins, for the bone of the upper arm seemed to have snapped. Tourniquets were applied and the injured man was borne tenderly to his cabin, where the wondering eyes of Darya took in the scene.

“Cut the wench down,” growled Achmed, as he bore his chief to his bed and put water mingled with wine to the waxen lips.

“Does the
reis
still live, O Achmed?” one of the corsair, a fat-bellied Turk named Kemal, inquired fearfully.

“He lives, O Kemal, but barely,” muttered the Moor. “He is standing on the brink of death.…”

“Will the
reis
not lose the arm, then?” asked another pirate named Haroot, a lank, dour, delicate-featured Persian.

Achmed of El-Cazar shrugged. “That lies with the will of Allah,” he said fatalistically. “Fetch me that water bucket, and more clean cloth—”

With hands as gentle as a woman’s, he bathed the sweaty brows of Kâiradine with a wet cloth and moistened his lips with wine and water again. The Redbeard seemed sunken deep in a coma, although his lips twitched and his shut eyes moved from side to side like one suffering in the clutch of a nightmare.

Was there venom in the fangs of the yith? Achmed did not know: never before, in all the annals of El-Cazar, had a man escaped with his life from the bite of the yith.
The jongleurs would make songs of this, if Kâiradine lived
, he thought.

“What shall we do with the savage girl?” one of the sailors asked.

Achmed rubbed his brow with a groan. The wench was already proving to be more trouble than she was worth—which was next to nothing. One beautiful young woman alone on a ship filled with woman-hungry men was a source of potential riot and mutiny—and if any of the crew touched her, and Kâiradine lived to know of it, there would be hangings.…

“Cover her body,” he growled curtly. “Take her to my cabin and chain her to the centerpost. Then lock the door and bring the keys to me.”

The corsair saluted sketchily and bore Darya unprotestingly away.

* * * *

All the next “sleep,” Achmed the Turk alternated between tending to his wounded captain and seeing that the ship was kept steady on her course to El-Cazar. With so many tasks to be seen to and so many decisions to be made, there was no time for Achmed to snatch so much as forty winks for himself.

But that’s the trouble with being first mate, he thought to himself wryly. None of the pleasures of captaincy, and much of the responsibility.…

The momentary flash of humor did little to relieve his gloom. For Achmed had been born and raised among the Barbary Pirates, and he knew how deeply they were torn into rival factions, and he knew that only the adhesive loyalty to the authentic descendant of the great Khair ud-Din of Algiers, Kâiradine’s ancestor, held the feuding corsair chieftains together in some sort of unity.

Lacking that loyalty, with Kâiradine dead, the fortress city would explode into civil war, destroying them all.

“Live, O my
reis
…
live!
” he prayed between his teeth to the unhearing skies.

PART II: PIRATES OF ZANTHODON

CHAPTER 6

THE VOYAGE OF THE
RED WITCH

Darya composed herself upon the floor of Achmed’s small cubicle of a cabin, but with no thought of slumber in her mind. A length of bedding taken from Kâiradine’s bunk covered her nakedness. She had drawn it about her slender body like a loose robe, and used the remainder of it to cushion the planking of the deck beneath her.

By one ankle was she securely tethered to the center post which supported the afterdeck overhead. After several busy minutes spent futilely attempting to free herself, the cavegirl gave the task up as a hopeless one. Now, stoically but with an inward fear she strove to conceal, she awaited whatever fate was to be hers, determined to sell her life dearly, and her maidenhead no less dearly.

When the corsairs had brought her into the first mate’s cabin, she had taken in her new surroundings with a swift, all-encompassing glance. The mate’s cabin was naturally smaller and less luxuriously appointed than was the cabin of the Pirate Prince of El-Cazar. A rude bunk was built into the wall, with shelves and drawers beneath it. One small porthole admitted light and fresh air, but even Darya knew all too well that it was too small to permit her to squeeze through it, should she be fortunate enough to set herself free from her bonds.

Even a woman as brave and daring as Darya of the Bronze Age may be forgiven for the despair which settled upon her valiant spirit. True, she had miraculously escaped being ravished by the Captain of the Barbary Pirates, but could that fate be long delayed? If he died beneath the fangs of the terrible yith, no longer would the fear of him restrain his sailors from visiting upon their helpless captive the brutal indignities she dreaded to contemplate…and from the appearance of his wounds, the girl thought it certain that the Redbeard was near death.

The worst thing about it was, quite simply, that Darya of Thandar had utterly no means of defending herself or of escaping from her present predicament. In fact, she could not even speak or understand the language in which her captors conversed—a bastardized and degenerate form of Algerian Arabic with a thick intermixture of Moorish and Bedouin terms.

This question of language was a source of puzzlement to the cavegirl. All of the peoples of the Underground World shared a common tongue, which Professor Potter once identified as “proto-Aryan,” the direct ancestor of ancient Sanskrit, and, therefore, of the entire family of Indo-European languages which includes Latin, Greek, French, English, Spanish, German and many more. It was the theory of the Professor that this was the original language of man, first used by our remote Cro-Magnon ancestors before the Ice Age.

But the Barbary Pirates had a language all their own, and this notion was strange to Darya. The only people that she had ever met who spoke a language different from the universal tongue of Zanthodon were the Professor and I. But surely these strange Men-Who-Rode-Upon-The-Water were not from the Upper World as she had been given to understand we were, for they did not resemble the scrawny scientist and me in speech, dress, customs or appearance.

Shrugging, the Princess of Thandar put the mystery aside as insoluble. And, also, as irrelevant, since it had no bearing upon the problem of her present state of captivity.

Long moments had passed, and no one entered the cabin. After a long while, her tension eased; she relaxed her vigilance a trifle. Whatever doom was before her, it evidently was not yet to befall.

Before long, her weariness overtook her consciousness. It had been an exhausting sequence of events, all that which had transpired since Eric Carstairs had led her and the other prisoners forth from the caverncity of the Gorpaks. She felt very weary.

After a time, she slept.

* * * *

Fumio crouched, sniffling miserably, in the dank and fetid darkness of the hold. The Thandarian renegade was feeling very sorry for himself. And with fairly good reason.

When Fumio had earlier peeked through the small trapdoor he had stared directly into the hungry eyes of the enormous yith as its terrible head rose dripping from the waves of the Sogar-Jad. With a yelp of terror, Fumio had instantly dropped the lid with a bang, and half-clambered, half-fell back down into the deeper parts of the hold, there to cower, trembling, expecting that each moment would be his last.

The sounds from the deck above had come to him muffled and distorted as they filtered through the thick planking of the deck above his head. Eventually, however, it dawned upon the hapless Fumio that the yith had either gone away of its own accord or had been driven hence by the Barbary Pirates.

When it became apparent to Fumio that he was not going to be devoured by the sea-dragon, he stole forth from his hidey-hole and sought once more the small trapdoor.

Unfortunately, this time it was battened down securely, which left the caveman with no recourse but to squat in the stinking darkness and await whatever hideous form of death his mysterious captors were reserving for him.

After a time, he, too, fell into a fitful and uneasy slumber.

But not for long.

Suddenly, the hatch creaked open, flooding the hold with the dazzle of day. Swarthy, sinister-looking crewmen clambered down to drag Fumio from his corner and shove him up the steps to the swaying deck. There incomprehensible commands were growled at him in the most menacing manner imaginable. When the caveman failed to understand what was wanted of him, one of the huge, darkskinned men fetched him up alongside the head with a clout that left Fumio reeling. Thereupon, he learned and very quickly what they wanted him to do.

The attack of the yith had taken the lives of a few crew members too many, and the
Red Witch
was left shorthanded. Recalling the presence of his second captive aboard the galley, the first mate ordered him pressed into service. Under the sharp eyes of Tarbu and Kemal, the miserable Fumio was set to work swabbing the deck, coiling ropes, repairing torn rigging, and performing, however unwillingly and without understanding what exactly these things
were
, a variety of other menial tasks which freed more experienced hands for more important duties elsewhere.

Soon, Fumio developed an aching back and a fine collection of ripe blisters upon his hands. He also collected a fine set of purplish bruises from the blows rained upon him by exasperated sailors, few of whom could speak more than a word or two of Zanthodonian.

That “night,” after a hearty but half-cooked meal, Fumio fell into the deep sleep of exhaustion, to be roused by booted feet thudding in his ribs to another round of vile, degrading tasks.

Nowhere did he espy Darya of Thandar.

In time he began to doubt if she was still aboard the
Red Witch
…although where else she could be the caveman could not imagine.

Perhaps, these fearsome ogres had thrown her overboard, to feed the yiths…!

Shuddering, Fumio bent with redoubled vigor to his tasks. He cared not a whit for Darya, who had been nothing but a continuous source of disastrously bad luck to Fumio—or so it seemed from his point of view. But he cared very, very much about what was going to happen to Fumio, and he resolved to work his fingers to the bone in order not to be flung to the yiths.

He was a gallant and unselfish chap, that Fumio.

* * * *

For many wakes and sleeps the
Red Witch
sailed “north” along the coast of the subterranean continent, eventually gaining the sea wherein many small and rocky islands rose from the foaming waves.

Here the mists which arose from the surface of the Sogar-Jad clung in milky veils about the fang-like rocks and small, jagged islets, obscuring one’s view. These scattered islets of the archipelago formed a natural barrier, protecting the pirates’ stronghold of El-Cazar from the attack of any potential enemies foolish enough to attempt to invade the pirate kingdom. The rocks and reefs also made navigation very tricky; true, Redbeard’s cabin contained detailed charts of the safer courses through this barrier, but always before Achmed had only conveyed the orders given to him by his captain, while Kâiradine studied the charts.

Achmed sweated it out. The basic problem was that while Redbeard could read, Achmed could not. The carefully inscribed markings and instructions and warnings on the master chart were as Greek to him.

Shoals scraped the keel of the ship, where the water was perilously shallow. Rocks rasped along the shuddering hull. Time and time again, only an instant’s warning enabled the sailors to swing aside from an impending collision with a half-glimpsed mass of rock that could have torn the hull asunder and sent the pirate galley to the bottom of the sea.

Achmed fervently wished that his captain were well enough to resume the command of the galley. True, Kâiradine was mending with remarkable speed, as his natural vigor and sheer animal vitality repaired the ravages done to his health by the terrible fangs of the giant plesiosaur.

But he was still partly delirious from a raging fever, and in no condition even to do so much as to interpret the charts to his first mate.

At length, however, they emerged into open sea again. The sea mists parted; daylight lit the magnificent vista before them, and the pirates cheered at the first glimpse of their island kingdom they had enjoyed in many months.

And Darya’s heart sank. Soon, she would be borne a captive behind that impregnable fortress, and would be alone and helpless amid a thousand enemies.

For…who could rescue her from the stronghold of El-Cazar?

CHAPTER 7

EL-CAZAR

Sheer from the foaming sea lifted the cliff walls of El-Cazar. Long combers broke in shattered and flying spray against those rocky ramparts. Lean corsair galleys rode at anchor in the shoulders of sheltering, granite quays.

The walls of El-Cazar were partly natural cliff, partly man-made masonry. They seemed towering and formidable to such as Darya and Fumio, who had never envisioned a structure made by human hands of a complexity superior to log huts.

Winding zigzag stairways cut from the living rock of the cliffs ascended from the harbor quays to tall gates set in the ramparts. Beyond the massive walls of El-Cazar sprawled the labyrinth of the town itself, a maze of crooked alleys and slovenly lean-to houses, mostly of adobe or rock faced with plaster painted in gaudy hues—lavender, canary, cream, azure, jade-green, scarlet—but some of the structures were of neatly dressed and fitted logs, tightly caulked with tarry pitch and roofed with sloping rows of red tile.

Cartagena must have looked like this, in the high, roaring days of the Spanish Main.…

As the captives were led into the city itself, a bewildering variety of noises, smells and scenes assaulted their senses. Crippled beggars whined from alley-mouths; painted slatterns wheedled and beckoned from second-story balconies, railed with elaborate wrought iron; drunken corsairs snored or brawled on the narrow streets, which were cobbled and which reeked of offal.

The town…
roared
…howling to the skies. From a thousand aleshops and wine-bars and gaming halls and pleasure-houses came the sounds of barroom fights, bawdy singing, laughter, carousal.

The stench which ascended from El-Cazar was frightful. The isle was solid rock, hence there were no sewers; in their place, a deep groove had been cut through the middle of the meandering, cobbled streets, through which there trickled sluggishly a vile and slimy stream clotted with refuse.

They passed inns or hostels which bore swinging signs in an almost Elizabethan manner, with names like The Crusader’s Head and Bucket o’ Blood and Jolly Rogues. From the smell of raw grain spirits and cheap wine which exuded from the swinging doors of these establishments, one could have correctly assumed that the Prophet’s admonition against the partaking of spiritous beverages was completely ignored in El-Cazar, or perhaps forgotten.

Such was El-Cazar, the pirate kingdom. From curtained balconies, veiled Eastern women peered down, slim and lissom in their long
kabbilays
, watching for the arrival of their masters, or their lovers, perhaps—sometimes, for both. Orange trees grew in walled private gardens, their snowy blossoms sweetening the odor-thick air. Fountains splashed and gurgled. They passed chandlers’ shops, warehouses, the establishment of merchants, streets devoted to gemsellers, goldsmiths, mapmakers, and coffeeshops where turbaned gentlemen reclined at their ease on soft carpets under striped awnings, sipping the potent black brew.

Such was El-Cazar.…

* * * *

With Achmed leading the way, the corsair crew of the
Red Witch
swaggered up the steep, ascending ways to the top of the town, to High Street, where uprose the imposing edifice which was the residence of the Barbary Prince.

They were accosted along the way by carousing comrades, who shouted hoarse expletives, rude inquiries, bawdy invitations. To which the corsairs of Kâiradine’s crew responded readily enough, and in kind. It was perhaps a blessing that Darya of Thandar could not understand a word of what was said, for all of it was vulgar and most of it was obscene.

Since this was, after all, the cavegirl’s first taste of “civilization,” had she been able to comprehend the meaning of the hoarse calls and crude remarks, they might have soured her on civilization forever.

Four sailors bore the litter on which reposed Kâiradine Redbeard. He was conscious at last, but weak and pale, having recovered during the long sea voyage from the taint of his infection and the resultant fever. Weak and pale and listless, he responded but feebly to the comments given by the throng. With a languid lifted hand he acknowledged the salutes of the captains whom he passed. They seemed amazed to see their prince so seriously incapacitated, and that boded ill, to Achmed’s way of thinking.

But there was nothing that could be done about it, reasoned the Moorish first mate. Under the perpetual afternoon skies of Zanthodon, it would be impossible to smuggle the wounded prince into the fortress city under cover of darkness. Now every rival for Kâiradine’s authority, and every potential challenger, dissatisfied by his laws or his leadership, would know that their chief was bedridden with a serious wound and would doubtless be so for weeks to come. And this worried Achmed.

Darya and Fumio stared about themselves with stark amazement and even a kind of awe. They would not have been quite so impressed had they seen the Scarlet City of Zar to the remote “east,” for that metropolis of the surviving colony of Minoan Crete was a far more splendid collection of edifices. At about the same time as Darya and Fumio were brought into El-Cazar, the Professor, Xask and I were being penned up in our luxurious prison suites in Zar, and the two Cro-Magnons did not share our experiences. But they were impressed enough, although Darya wrinkled up her pert little nose at the stench of the trickling sewage and at the mounds of collapsing and rotting garbage which choked every alleymouth and many doorways.