Under the Moons of Mars (37 page)

And then I turned to see the third thing, and I knew then why the entire army of pirates has stalled in this moment.

The sky was full of ships.

Hundreds of them. Thousands. The great combined host of Helium and the Tharks, together in a fleet such as no man has seen in the skies of Barsoom in fifty thousand years. I do not know how our scout reached the capital in time. Perhaps he found a patrol in their airship and flew like a demon wind to spread the news and sound the alert. I will never know, and do not care. John Carter had come, and that was all that mattered. He had come . . . and with the greatest force of arms this world could yet muster. Here, to this barren place by a forgotten outpost. Here to fight the last battle. Whoever won this war would rule Barsoom forever.

John Carter, Warlord of Warlords, grown wise in his years, knew this and he brought such a force that the pirates howled in fear.

But . . . ah, they did not throw down their weapons.

I will honor them enough to say that, and to say that they made a fight of it that
will
make songs worth singing.

Yet, my heart was lifted as I looked up and saw a fleet so vast that it darkened the skies.

Or . . . was it my eyes that grew dark?

I felt a burning pain and looked down to see the glittering length of a sword moving through me below my heart.

And the voice of the singer faded, even to his own ears.

4

I
t was a cold night in Helium. The moons were like chips of ice in the black forever that stretched above the royal palace.

A Barsoomian Gazetteer,
or, Who’s Who and What’s What
on Mars

A six-limbed creature found near the North Pole of Mars. Its white color permits it to blend in with ice or snow. Its most notable feature is its eyes, which are faceted like those of an Earthly house fly. Each facet can be opened or closed independently. Because of its six limbs, the apt is in all likelihood evolutionarily related to both the white apes and the Green Men of Mars.

A professional society of Martian trained killers-for-hire, roughly comparable to the Earthly Mafia or Yakuza.

Sometimes known as the “Martian lion,” the banth is a large, dangerous carnivore. It is largely hairless except for a thick ruff similar to that of the male terrestrial lion. Banths live and hunt in packs. Their multiple rows of razor-sharp, daggerlike teeth can make quick work of their prey. Some Barsoomians have succeeded in at least partially domesticating banths and use them to torture and even murder prisoners. One thinks of the practice in Imperial Rome of disposing of victims by “throwing them to the lions.”

A soldier of the Union (Northern) army during the American Civil War. Origin uncertain, but the term probably refers to the blue uniforms worn by most Union soldiers; most Southern soldiers wore gray uniforms.

A Martian animal roughly comparable to the Earthly dog. Calots are huge, fierce beasts capable of terrible destruction. They have ten short legs and are immensely powerful.

An important chief or “nantan” of the Chiricahua Apaches (1805–1874). Cochise led his people in resisting the encroachment of white soldiers and settlers on their land in the American Southwest. He was especially embittered when his father-in-law, Mangas Coloradas, who had been invited to a supposedly peaceful conference with white military officers, was instead arrested and imprisoned. Cochise then decided that the white Americans had no sense of honor. He was a brilliant military strategist and inspiring leader of his people. In later years he negotiated a treaty with the army, represented by General Oliver Howard. Cochise’s one white friend of many years’ standing was Tom Jeffords, who helped to negotiate the treaty. Edgar Rice Burroughs held Native Americans in high esteem, especially members of the Apache Nation, as shown in his novels
The War Chief
and
Apache Devil
. Cochise meets up with John Carter in Chris Claremont’s story “The Ghost That Haunts the Superstition Mountains” in this anthology.

A beautiful Red Martian Princess, described by John Carter as “incomparable.” She is from the great Martian city of Helium, descended from Jeddaks, the rulers of the Martian tribes. In appearance she is totally human, with a perfect red complexion. However, like all members of her race, she was hatched from an egg and will lay eggs from which her children will be hatched. In time she marries John Carter and they have a son and daughter, and grandchildren. The egg-laying gene inherited from Dejah Thoris seems to be dominant over John Carter’s live-bearing heredity, as all of their descendents are egg-layers, not live-bearers.

A military rank, equivalent to a captain. [See
Military Titles
]

Of course we know of Mr. Burroughs (born 1875, died 1950) as one of the most famous and successful authors of his time. In addition to John Carter and the wonderful Barsoom novels, Burroughs was the creator of the even more famous Tarzan of the Apes, about whom he wrote some two dozen books. Burroughs also wrote other science fiction novels, westerns, detective stories, and realistic fiction. He also put himself into a number of his books as a character. In this form he was born in 1855 and was related to his “Uncle Jack”—John Carter. This fictional Edgar Rice Burroughs lived a very long life and aged slowly. Even so, the last time he met John Carter during one of Carter’s visits to Earth, Burroughs mentions that he is now an old man while John Carter still appears to be thirty years old.

Much Barsoomian science and technology is based on the study of natural rays emanating from the sun. Two vitally important solar rays, unknown to terrestrial science but understood and utilized on Barsoom, are the Eighth and Ninth Rays. The Eighth Ray provides propulsion for Martian fliers. It can be accumulated and held in tanks rather as electrical energy is held in storage batteries on Earth. Edgar Rice Burroughs’s father owned a factory where storage batteries were built. The Ninth Ray is even more important, as it is the primary power source of the Barsoomian atmosphere plant.

A kind of stone found on Barsoom.

A major form of transportation and of combat on Mars is the flier. These aircraft come in many sizes and models, ranging from one-person transports to great cargo craft and aerial battleships. They are powered either by radium engines or by the magnetic field of the planet itself. They are also fitted with propellers to help them move through the air. A similar device, fitted with gigantic wheels, is sometimes used for ground transportation but the aerial models are dominant.

The Jed of Gathol, Gahan met Tara, daughter of John Carter and Dejah Thoris, at a palace party in Helium. So smitten was he with Tara’s beauty that he tried to make love to her, following which she leaves angrily in her personal flier. The flier is caught in a Martian windstorm (an event that in recent years has been proven actually to occur on Mars). Gahan pursues Tara to the city of Bantoom where they encounter Ghek the Kaldane and Luud, the King of the Kaldanes. Another flight ensues, and Gahan engages in a deadly game of Jetan in the city of Manator, finally winning the freedom—and the love—of Tara. After they marry they have a daughter, Llana of Gathol.