The Zanthodon MEGAPACK ™: The Complete 5-Book Series (65 page)

Professor Potter licked his lips, thinking of New Crete which, with its flush toilets and hot and cold running water, was a considerably higher civilization than certain rural towns in Mississippi and Alabama which he had visited, and which lacked these same amenities to a noticeable degree.

“Well, ah, to tell the truth,” he muttered lamely.

Xask smiled. The elderly outlander might be more learned than he in strange skills and curious lore, but he was as easily coerced as any other human mortal whom Xask had yet encountered.

Then he told the Professor what he wanted him to do.

CHAPTER 19

THE HUNTER AND THE HUNTED

Garth watched grimly as the half-circle of Zarian guards approached the place where his host had taken its stand. He did not fear the olive-hued, strangely clothed little men, for they were few in numbers, slim and short of build, lightly armed. What he
did
fear was the tremendous beasts they rode, which he knew as thodars; Professor Potter might have identified them as a subspecies of brontosaurus, smaller and lighter than a true brontosaurus, and adapted to life on the plains rather than in the swamps and marshes, but still formidable and mighty beasts, with their long, snaky necks, barrel bodies, and long tapering tails.

They were coated in a slick, leathery hide a dark greenish-gray in coloration, paling to yellowish-white on the underside and belly. They moved along on huge, bowed legs as thick around as tree trunks, ending in splayed feet whose ponderous tread shook the earth. They must have weighed tons, and brave indeed would be the warrior willing to face them in battle.

The psychological advantage of taming and riding the great thodars was an obvious one. Professor Potter, had he been present to watch the effect these ponderous, lumbering reptiles had on the brave and stalwart Cro-Magnon fighting men, might well have been reminded of the devastating psychological impact which the ancient Greeks and Romans suffered every time they faced in battle Eastern armies mounted on Indian elephants. The only difference here was that the thodars were at least five times the size and weight of the largest Indian elephant ever seen.

The small Zarian with the gilded cuirass who rode the lead thodar and who was probably Captain Raphad, as his brows were crowned with the orichalcum band which bore the telephathic crystal which controlled the giant brutes, uttered a shrill command in a language hitherto unheard by the men of Sothar. At once, and in perfect order, the riders urged their beasts into something which resembled a charge in slow motion.

The ground literally trembled under the mighty feet of the advancing circle of thodars. Warrior of Sothar glanced at warrior of Sothar; men paled, licked lips suddenly dry, but no one broke and ran.

“We do not stand a chance, my Omad,” said one of Garth’s chieftains who stood near. No fear was audible in his quiet tones, only a somber hopelessness.

Garth considered, frowning. Behind his majestic brows, his alert and agile mind raced. For what the chieftain had said was perfectly true: there was no hope of slaying beasts so mighty as these. Bristling with a score of spears, they would still remain on their feet and moving forward.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, inspiration struck. Garth, although a primitive Cro-Magnon savage, was a great leader of men in peace and in war; and great leaders have at least one thing in common, that being the ability to devise bold new methods of warfare. Alexander, Napoleon, Caesar, Hannibal, all have possessed this uncanny knack, and triumphed over incredible numbers. Which is why we remember them as great leaders, rather than the foes, like Vercingetorix and Darius, whom they soundly defeated!

“Bowmen!
Pick off the riders!
Do not attempt to slay the thodars, nor even to injure them!” he cried in a great voice like a roll of thunder.

The wisdom of Garth’s words instantly struck new courage and fortitude into the hearts of his wavering men. All knew the thodars to be placid and docile grass-eaters rather than dangerous carnivores. With their riders slain, the beasts might very well wander off to crop the meadow grasses, indifferent to the presence of the Sotharians.

Bows were strung and lifted, feathered bows were bent until featured tips touched the earlobes of the archers. With a taut, humming song, long straight shafts were loosed and barbed death struck the advancing reptiles.

And the first arrow caught Captain Raphad straight between the eyes.…

* * * *

Yualla and Murg continued on across the plains, drawing ever nearer to the range of mountains known as the Walls of Zar. The girl maintained a rapid, limber, space-eating stride, for she was impatient to join forces with Hurok and the other warriors, and reluctant to miss any of the excitement of this adventure which she had impulsively determined to share.

Murg, his bony wrists lashed together behind his back, a noose about his throat, must perforce trot along behind the cave-girl. This was because she bore one end of the tether about his neck in her small, capable fist. If he failed to keep up with her, he might well be strangled.

Or so Murg feared. Actually, the girl was too tenderhearted (at least as concerned enemies she viewed with contempt, like Murg) to have let the miserable little man strangle.

Fortunately for Yualla and Murg few beasts more dangerous than the plump, timid, and edible little uld roamed the plains this close to the Walls of Zar, for the larger and more ferocious predators were held at bay for fear of the mighty thodars. Although they are not vegetarians and not carnivores, the brontosaurs are so large and heavy that they can break the backs of lesser reptiles or even of the mighty mastodons and woolly mammoths by simply stepping on them—which reminds me of the time a triceratops had the Professor and me treed, during our first day or so in Zanthodon, and got into a fight with a woolly mammoth, which promptly broke the back of the triceratops in the very manner I have just described.
[2]

Of all the beasts of Zanthodon the Underground World, one of the most fearless, as it is one of the most ferocious, is the mighty vandar or sabertooth tiger. Twice the size of the Bengal tigers of the Upper World is this sleek, tawny, vicious brute, whose powerful jaws, armed with the formidable footlong fangs which give the monster its name, make it a deadly adversary even for the great saurians who share the jungle world with it.

One particular vandar, fully grown and weighing more than a percheron, was roaming the grasslands hungrily this day. The jungles which bordered the northern plains to the south were empty of game, and hunger gnawed at the vitals of the giant cat. For many wakes it had not made its kill and now, goaded almost to the point of madness by the pangs of starvation, it had ventured out onto the broad plains in search of game. Doubtless, its small but cunning brain was teeming with images of the plump, inoffensive, and succulent uld which it knew were to be found aplenty amid the grassy plains beyond the jungle’s verge.

That these plains were ruled by the little olive-hued men who rode upon the feared and mighty thodars was well known to the sabertooth. This knowledge suggested caution to the predator; but hunger has a logic which can supercede even knowledge. And, were the vandar to have been capable of human reason, it might well have reasoned thus: better to die swiftly and cleanly beneath the tread of the thodar, than to die meanly by inches from starvation.

Mad with hunger though it was, the vandar crept furtively upon the plains into the region of low hills and ravines which bordered upon the mountains. Here the ponderous, slow-moving thodars could not move about, save in certain pathways. By avoiding those paths, which, of course, savored pungently of the spoor and droppings of the huge reptiles, the vandar hoped to avoid a confrontation.

Keeping well to the shadows, clambering lithely over the boulders and broken rocks, the great cat glided through the hills, seeking the borders of the open plain. It paused atop a rounded knoll to taste the humid breeze with twitching, sensitive nostrils. The oily smell of thodars was upon the wind, for they were abroad today, tracking the Sotharian tribes. But the mouth-watering odors of tender uld also rode upon the brisk winds, and the sabertooth slavered as it caught the scent.

Abandoning cover, the great cat sprang down and slunk into the thickly grown meadow grass. As it prowled, snuffling the ground for uld spoor, another odor even more inviting came to its nostrils.

The scent of human flesh
.…

The sabertooth had made human kills before, and in one corner of its bestial brain it warily knew that two-legged prey most often went armed with sharp and heavy rocks fastened in some mysterious fashion to the end of short sticks, or with throwing-sticks which were long and sharply pointed and could somehow kill from a distance.

But this knowledge lurked in one corner of the vandar’s brain only, and all the rest of that organ was possessed to the point of madness by
hunger
. And so overwhelming had that hunger become by now that it drowned out all caution in the mind of the famished supertiger.

It tested the breeze, and found that it did not have to track this new game, for the game was advancing upon it with swift and eager strides.

The striped cat easily concealed itself in the cover of the long grasses, and crouched, belly to the earth, tail-tip twitching, ready to launch upon its terrible and irresistible charge.

The earth trembled slightly beneath its body, beating like a drum from the impact of striding human feet.

The vibration was so slight that only a canny predator might have caught and interpreted it, but the vandar was full-grown, a veteran fighter, an experienced hunter, and could read that faint, far drumming with ease.

It crouched, tension gathering in the coiled and steely muscles of its lean hindquarters.

The game was only instants away now, and the vandar was crouched in the concealing grasses directly in its path.…

* * * *

Yualla came across the grasses toward the first of the hills with a light, rapid pace, poor Murg wheezing and puffing as he trotted along in her wake.

The girl did not even have time to scream as the thick grasses parted to reveal a hideous face distorted in a snarl of fury.

In the next instant a tawny form hurtled upon her like a furry thunderbolt.

CHAPTER 20

THEY REACH ZAR

Hurok stood, heavy arms folded upon his hairy breast, and stared down thoughtfully into the valley of the inland sea. There before him stretched the immensity of Zar, the Scarlet City of the Minoans. And what a spectacle it was!

Never in all of his days had the mighty Neanderthal of Kor seen a city. Never had he even imagined one. All he knew was Kor, land of the Apemen, with its caves burrowed into the cliffs, and the jungle country of Thandar and the other Cro-Magnon nations, and the cavern-city of the Gorpaks and the ghastly Sluaggh.

He was impressed in spite of himself, was Hurok the Apeman. The massive structures were obviously man-made, looming two or three stories into the air, spired with squat, four-sided towers and slim obelisks. Toward the central parts of the Scarlet City loomed the palace citadel atop its high place, perhaps the most stupendous mass of masonry ever erected within Zanthodon the Underground World.

Dim, small eyes peering and blinking beneath the heavy shelf of his bony brows, the apelike Neanderthal slowly looked over the city…the streets and boulevards and avenues and narrow, dark alleys between the looming piles of masonry…the squares and forums and bazaars, like open glades or clearings amid the forest of buildings…the palaces and temples, mansions and warehouses, fortresses and barracks…and, beyond, the vast, walled, seatringed oval that was the mighty arena.…

Fantastic and bizarre were the decorations which ornamented the city: friezes and mosaics, tapestries and banners, statues and idols and stone monsters, carven masks and leering dragons, the glitter of glazed tile, the rich mingling of brazen colors flaunting their brilliance back in the face of daylight…the throng which surged to and fro in the streets, ragged beggars whining for alms, fat-bellied merchants squatting on bits of carpet under striped awnings, guardsmen alert and vigilant atop the towers, daylight flashing from gilt helm and spear-blade and trident…veiled women glimpsed in swinging palanquins borne on the brawny shoulders of blond slaves…fountains playing, rooftop gardens.…

And upon the breast of the inland sea itself, the watery moat which guarded Zar from its enemies no less staunchly than did the sheltering wall of mountains, ships bobbed at anchor: pleasure craft glided to and fro, laden with blossoms and girls…stern, brass-beaked war triremes lashed to the end of stone piers…merchant ships, as fatbellied as their owners, plied the bright waters, hulls crammed with casks of red wine and wild honey, chests of gems and worked brass and carven ivory hewn from the curlicue tusks of mammoths, bales of cotton, rolled-up carpets, tin pots, ripe fruits, bales of golden grain—

Hurok blinked, and rubbed his eyes, dazed and bedazzled at the complexity, the colors, the sheer, inconceivable newness of so much in the busy, bustling, gaudy, magnificent scene which stretched far beneath where he stood on the farther slopes of the mountain range.

Behind and about him, his warriors crouched and stared, with much the same awe and amazement that filled his mighty breast. For the Cro-Magnon warriors of Sothar and distant Thandar dwelt, for the better part, in bamboo huts or long, rambling, low-roofed structures which resembled log cabins. Only the High House of the Omad was taller, a two-storied building which had heretofore seemed to their simple imaginations the most impressive structures of which human hands were capable.

And now they looked for the first time upon one of the last cities in the world wherein the grandeur and might of the ancient world could still be seen. Only, perhaps, in the ruins of Pompeii or Knossos could the magnificence of the mighty past be glimpsed, and only in part, the gaps in those ruins pieced together by the magic of imagination. But here was one of the oldest cities of the world, surviving in all its fantastic richness and color!

“O Hurok,” muttered Varak from his side in dazed, low tones, “how can we ever hope to find Eric Carstairs and the old man in all of…
that
?”

The Neanderthal shook his heavy, low-browed head ponderously, choosing silence over speech. He could not have said what he had expected to find—a valley whose cliff walls were pocked by caves, perhaps, or a palisade-walled cluster of wood huts, such as he had seen on slave-raiding expeditions into Thandar and Gorad and Numitor and other Cro-Magnon lands.

But he could never have imagined anything like
this
.

“What shall we do, my chieftain?” muttered Erdon helplessly, from where he stood beside his brother-in-arms, Ragor. “We are six warriors against many, many times that number. How can we do battle against so many, or find our way to the side of Eric Carstairs amid that—that wilderness of colored stone?”

The Apeman of Kor spoke up then, but with his customary brevity.

“We can but try,” he said dully. “For at least to try is what Black Hair would expect of us. Not—miracles.…”