The Zanthodon MEGAPACK ™: The Complete 5-Book Series (61 page)

“Quite a pad,” I remarked, looking around. “Better than the slave pens of the cavern-city, at any rate!”

“There’s no question about
that
, my boy!” the Professor chuckled, sinking into one of the divans with bliss written across his features. “So long as we, I mean
you
, can manage to stay in the good graces of the Queen, we shall be living in the veritable lap of luxury.…”

“And eating pretty high off the hog, as well,” I informed him. “Forgot to mention it, but we’ve been invited to a royal banquet tonight.”

“Which will further serve to discomfort your friend Cromus, to say nothing of our old comrade, Xask,” he mused. “We are in dangerous waters, my boy, and I hope you realize the fact! Imperial courts like this are a seething hotbed of Byzantine intrigues, plots and counter-plots and…well, all that sort of thing. But—Sainted Schliemann, what an opportunity! There is not an archaeologist alive who would not sell his soul for a chance like this! To observe at first hand the people of Minoan Crete, their customs and traditions, crafts and arts, daily life…It is very like being equipped with Mr. Wells’s Time Machine, and voyaging back nearly four thousand years to Knossus at its height…!”

“You really think these people are still living the way their ancient ancestors lived, Doc?” I asked skeptically. “Any reasons why they couldn’t have changed, progressed, over all those centuries? I mean, look at our Cro-Magnon friends, the warriors of Thandar and Sothar: they made it on their own out of the Stone Age, discovering how to make copper and bronze and Lord knows what else.”

“That is true enough, Eric,” he said, pursing his lips judiciously. “Under the pressure of adversity, battling against the beasts and rival tribes of Zanthodon, our Cro-Magnon friends rose to the occasion and advanced, I think, rather remarkably. But the Cretans were decadent even back in the days of Knossus, and here on their island-city they are almost completely insulated from the perils and monsters of the Underground World, walled away behind that range of mountains, guarded by their wide moat…the motifs of their frescoes and mosaics, the ornamentation on their urns and vases, their modes of dress, even their architectural styles, are one and the same with those uncovered from the ruins of Knossus by Sir Arthur Evans. I very much doubt if the people of Zar have altered their life-style significantly in all this time.”

“Well, we’ll have to wait and see, I guess.”

* * * *

That night the royal banquet proved to be like something out of a Cecil B. DeMille movie epic. There were dancing girls in skimpy garments, lithe acrobats, clowns, twanging but not unharmonious music played on odd little bagpipes, lutes or harps or something like that, small brightly colored drums, and chimes and cymbals.

We reclined on sumptuous couches, decked out in long-sleeved robes, hand-fed by kneeling slaves. I couldn’t begin to tell you what we ate, but every dish was saturated with herbs and spices until we gave up trying to identify the source.

There were little cubes of meat on long skewers with raw onions in between, just like shish kebab; thirty kinds of soups and stews and broths and ragouts; pastries made to look like squid and sharks and dolphins; jellied fruits and honeyhearted wines and preposterous sherbets built out of shaved ice and soaked in fruit juices; and, above all, there was seafood, seafood, seafood.

Crete used to be the major sea power of the ancient Mediterranean, and the Zarians have never forgotten it.

Cromus was there, and so was Hissab, and some of the courtiers I recognized from the throne room, but everyone else was a stranger to me as I was to them. Gossip had gotten around, however, and the men all smiled and waved when I happened to look in their direction, while the women flirted and ogled me, whispering to each other about me behind their feather fans. I felt distinctly uncomfortable, but this was the first truly civilized meal I had enjoyed during all the weeks or months I had spent in Zanthodon, and I tackled it with gusto.

Zarys sat across from me, reclining on a silken couch being fanned by two stalwart blond Cro-Magnon slaves in very brief scarlet loincloths. She wore a long gown with deep sleeves made of some soft crinkly stuff that began at the shoulders as salmon pink and deepened in hue as you went down, until the hem was royal purple. This time the golden wig was gone and her exquisite skull wore a tall headdress that was one glittering mass of blue-white diamonds.

Her breasts were bare but this time the nipples had been painted with liquid gold.

Outside of a languorous glance or two in my direction, she more or less ignored me, placidly permitting herself to be fed. I was just as pleased to be ignored, and busied myself with filling my belly.

After one long murderous glare at me, Cromus ignored me. He wore his gilt armor and a scarlet-plumed headdress, rather like an Indian chief’s, and looked grand, I must admit. But he was still quite a bit out of sorts; I could tell he was holding his temper under control, and just barely, because when one of the slave girls—a timid little thing with huge frightened eyes and a shy manner—spilled a little wine, he slapped her resoundingly and angrily wiped the dribble off his chin, brusquely demanding to be served by a less clumsy slave for the rest of the meal.

I could gladly have knocked him down again for that, but I controlled the impulse.

After dinner, slaves snuffed out the candelabra, plunging the windowless room into thick gloom, which was a real novelty here in the Underground World. Then a troupe of dancers came in stark naked, their lithe limbs, bare breasts, and long slender legs painted with some phosphorescent substance so that they glowed with weird colors in the dark. It was a gorgeous dance, I have to admit.

Although, as things turned out, I didn’t get to see very much of it. Because, just as we were settling down to watch the luminous dancers, a girl touched me on the wrist. I turned around, recognizing the Empress’s handmaiden, the one called Ialys.

She laid her fingertip across my lips as they parted to ask her what was up.

Obeying her tug on my sleeve, I got up and followed her through the darkened room. Whether or not anybody besides the Professor happened to notice me go, I’ve no idea.

At the doorway, I asked her what was up. She smiled kittenishly, with demurely downcast eyes.

“The Divine Zarys awaits you for a private audience,” the girl whispered.

Here it comes
, I thought with a sinking heart.

And I was right, too.…

CHAPTER 13

SUNDERED PATHS

From his place amid the plain, Sarga the huntsman watched with horror as the monstrous flying reptile carried away the limp, dangling body of the princess of his tribe.

The grizzled veteran had followed the spoor of Yualla of Sothar when the headstrong girl had decided to strike out on her own in quest of game. He knew very well her reckless, adventuresome ways, having watched her grow from childhood. Partly, he admired her for her contempt of danger and her skills at tracking game, which were qualities he might heartily have desired to discover in any son of his; but, as she was his responsibility as chief of the hunting party, he grimly dreamed of turning her over his knee (or whatever the Cro-Magnon equivalent of a good spanking is) and giving her a lesson in obedience.

When the thakdol descended upon her, Sarga was very far away from where Yualla was—too far away even for his bow to send a feathered shaft. And the pterodactyl had borne the blonde girl into the skies before even his fleet foot could bring him near enough to fight in her defense.

Now, with a sinking heart and a feeling of utter helplessness, he stood and watched as the winged dragon bore the girl aloft. From his distance, even the keen eyes of Sarga could not tell whether it was a living girl the thakdol carried off or a mangled corpse. But somehow Sarga did not quite believe that Yualla had been slain, for all that she hung limply from those cruel claws. He knew her well enough to know that Yualla would have fought with every skill at her command rather than yield supinely to the thakdol’s attack. And no sounds of battle had reached his ears.

Marking with his gaze the direction in which the reptile slowly flew on flapping wings, heavily burdened by its prey, the huntsman lifted to his lips the hollowed aurochs horn he wore belted at his waist and sounded a call. Shortly there came to him through the long grasses the others of his hunting party, summoned from their stalking by the signal. In swift, blunt words Sarga made known to them what had just occurred, and indicated the direction in which the pterodactyl had carried Yualla.

“Doubtless the thakdols nest in the peaks of that range of mountains in the distance,” he remarked. “It is the nature of such beasts to bear to their nesting place their kill, to be devoured at leisure or to be fed to their young.”

“If the gomad Yualla has been slain, O Sarga, it makes no difference in which direction her corpse was carried,” reasoned one of the younger hunters. A cold smile touched the lips of the older man.

“But if the gomad Yualla lives, then it makes all the difference in the world,” he pointed out.

“What, then, shall we do?” demanded another of the party.

“We shall return to the encampment of the tribes and bring these sad matters to the attention of the Omad Garth,” said Sarga. “As to that which will transpire thereafter, it is up to the Omad to make the decision. Come, let us begone with what little game we have managed thus far to procure.”

* * * *

Wasting as little time as possible, the hunting party returned to camp and found Garth of Sothar and his mate in conversation with one of the warriors of the Thandarians. They were discussing the direction and the duration of that day’s march, but the conversation was swiftly terminated as soon as Sarga had informed his chief of what had happened.

The brows of Garth of Sothar darkened thunderously and he set his jaw grimly against any display of emotion which might appear unmanly. But those who stood nearby could not help but notice that he balled his fists with great force, as if crushing the throat of an enemy. So tightly did Garth of Sothar clench his mighty fists that blood spurted from beneath the nails.

His mate, Nian, stood nearby—a handsome, strong woman just past the blush of her first youth, fit mate for the mighty jungle monarch. At the sad news which Sarga related, she paled and bit her lip, but said nothing. She held her head proudly high, but involuntary tears welled up behind her blue eyes.

The Cro-Magnons of Zanthodon are, of course, true savages in the finest sense of the word. That is, they are primitives with a rich but simple and thriving culture, their vigor and emotional honesty unencumbered by the accretions of custom and tradition imposed by so-called “civilization.” Unlike us of the Western world, they are not ashamed of their emotions, any more than they are ashamed to bare their bodies before others, as prudery and the puritanical repressions of civilization as yet do not constrict their natural responses. There is, I suppose, much about them that would seem shocking to a native of New York or London. The women nonchalantly bare their breasts and both sexes freely employ the great outdoors for their sanitary needs, in lieu of toilets. But let me assure you that there is much about our urban way of life that would seem shocking to the citizens of Thandar or Sothar—our denial of natural emotions, our sense of shame, our repression of the animal instincts, and the ways we cover our bodies and fear and shun the wilderness.

What I am attempting to explain is that it is as common to see a Cro-Magnon male burst into tears over the loss of a comrade as it is to see a Cro-Magnon woman defend her hearth and brood against marauders with a battle-axe. But the High Chief of a tribe, and his mate as well, hold themselves proudly before the eyes of all as an example of stoicism, dignity, and courage. Thus Garth and Nian bore themselves bravely under the shock of Yualla’s loss.

Within mere moments, mastering his emotions, Garth had elicited from his huntsman the essential facts surrounding the disappearance of his daughter. Nor did Sarga neglect to advise him of the precise direction in which the pterodactyl had flown, and of the conjectures voiced at the time about its probable destination. The Omad of Sothar was familiar with the habits of thakdols and knew as well as did Sarga that hunting pterodactyls generally carry their prey back to their nests and that they generally nest on mountain peaks, such as those dimly visible across the breadth of the mighty plain.

“Remain here,” said Garth to his huntsmen. “Rest. Replenish your supplies of water. Gather your weapons. Summon the chieftains, woman—I shall take counsel with my brother, Tharn of Thandar, and will soon return.” With those words he strode off across the camp in the direction of Tharn’s tent, a kingly figure, straight as a soldier, his features clamped tight in a cold mask against the intolerable pain he bore in his heart.

* * * *

Such was the dignity of the two High Chiefs that it would have been unseemly had Tharn expressed his consternation at the word that the daughter of Garth had been carried off by beasts. Such men as they speak seldom, and to the point, wasting neither words nor energy in displays of emotion.

They both knew exactly what was about to happen. The two Cro-Magnon tribes, which had stood and fought together shoulder to shoulder ever since the battle of the cavern-city against the Gorpaks and the hideous Sluaggh, must now sunder their paths and go their separate ways—at least, for a time.

It was, in fact, Tharn who suggested the inevitable.

“There is, in honor, no other way, my brother,” he said sternly. “During this long trek, you and your valiant warriors have served me well in my own quest for my lost daughter, Darya. It would be inconceivable for Tharn to ask that the Omad Garth continue to assist him in his search, when now the gomad Yualla has met with a similar fate. The tribes of Sothar and of Thandar must now part. There is no other course to follow.”

“I agree,” nodded Garth. “For blood calls to blood, and I cannot stand idly by while at least a chance exists that my child yet lives. Neither can I reasonably expect my brother Tharn to abandon the search for his own child, to assist me in my quest. We are agreed, then, that much as it grieves us both—our paths must here part.”

“It is agreed. We shall divide the stores and the weapons, the garments and the tents and bedding, between us evenly,” said Tharn. “Naught must be allowed to delay the departure of the warriors of Sothar from the rescue.”

“It may well be that we shall meet again,” said the Sotharian. “On his part, it is the wish of Garth the Omad that such will prove the case. For, inasmuch as our own homeland has been destroyed, the tribe of Sothar has nowhere to go in a world filled with hostile tribes and enemies, both human and bestial. In such a world, my brother, it is good to have found a friend.”

The two men clasped each other’s shoulder in the Zanthodonian equivalent of a hearty handshake.

And there was really nothing more to say.

* * * *

The equal division of the supplies was swiftly accomplished, and farewells were made. During the time they had marched and fought together, brief though it was, the men and women and children of the two tribes had made many friends, and partings are never pleasant. But time was of the essence, so the partings were brief.

While the men of Thandar stood silently watching, the tribe of Sotharians departed. There were no backward glances, and there were no tears. Fate had stepped between the two Cro-Magnon tribes, and that was all there was to it.

Garth struck out boldly into the midst of the plain, heading directly for the distant mountains which, as we know but he did not, formed a wall behind whose towering ramparts lay sheltered the Scarlet City of Zar.