The Chessmen of Mars Read online

  CHAPTER III

  THE HEADLESS HUMANS

  Above the roof of the palace that housed the Jed of Gathol and hisentourage, the cruiser Vanator tore at her stout moorings. The groaningtackle bespoke the mad fury of the gale, while the worried faces ofthose members of the crew whose duties demanded their presence on thestraining craft gave corroborative evidence of the gravity of thesituation. Only stout lashings prevented these men from being sweptfrom the deck, while those upon the roof below were constantlycompelled to cling to rails and stanchions to save themselves frombeing carried away by each new burst of meteoric fury. Upon the prow ofthe Vanator was painted the device of Gathol, but no pennants weredisplayed in the upper works since the storm had carried away severalin rapid succession, just as it seemed to the watching men that it mustcarry away the ship itself. They could not believe that any tacklecould withstand for long this Titanic force. To each of the twelvelashings clung a brawny warrior with drawn short-sword. Had but asingle mooring given to the power of the tempest eleven short-swordswould have cut the others; since, partially moored, the ship wasdoomed, while free in the tempest it stood at least some slight chancefor life.

  "By the blood of Issus, I believe they will hold!" screamed one warriorto another.

  "And if they do not hold may the spirits of our ancestors reward thebrave warriors upon the Vanator," replied another of those upon theroof of the palace, "for it will not be long from the moment her cablespart before her crew dons the leather of the dead; but yet, Tanus, Ibelieve they will hold. Give thanks at least that we did not sailbefore the tempest fell, since now each of us has a chance to live."

  "Yes," replied Tanus, "I should hate to be abroad today upon thestoutest ship that sails the Barsoomian sky."

  It was then that Gahan the Jed appeared upon the roof. With him werethe balance of his own party and a dozen warriors of Helium. The youngchief turned to his followers.

  "I sail at once upon the Vanator," he said, "in search of Tara ofHelium who is thought to have been carried away upon a one-man flier bythe storm. I do not need to explain to you the slender chances theVanator has to withstand the fury of the tempest, nor will I order youto your deaths. Let those who wish remain behind without dishonor. Theothers will follow me," and he leaped for the rope ladder that lashedwildly in the gale.

  The first man to follow him was Tanus and when the last reached thedeck of the cruiser there remained upon the palace roof only the twelvewarriors of Helium, who, with naked swords, had taken the posts of theGatholians at the moorings.

  Not a single warrior who had remained aboard the Vanator would leaveher now.

  "I expected no less," said Gahan, as with the help of those already onthe deck he and the others found secure lashings. The commander of theVanator shook his head. He loved his trim craft, the pride of her classin the little navy of Gathol. It was of her he thought--not of himself.He saw her lying torn and twisted upon the ochre vegetation of somedistant sea-bottom, to be presently overrun and looted by some savage,green horde. He looked at Gahan.

  "Are you ready, San Tothis?" asked the jed.

  "All is ready."

  "Then cut away!"

  Word was passed across the deck and over the side to the Heliumeticwarriors below that at the third gun they were to cut away. Twelve keenswords must strike simultaneously and with equal power, and each mustsever completely and instantly three strands of heavy cable that noloose end fouling a block bring immediate disaster upon the Vanator.

  Boom! The voice of the signal gun rolled down through the screamingwind to the twelve warriors upon the roof. Boom! Twelve swords wereraised above twelve brawny shoulders. Boom! Twelve keen edges severedtwelve complaining moorings, clean and as one.

  The Vanator, her propellors whirling, shot forward with the storm. Thetempest struck her in the stern as with a mailed fist and stood thegreat ship upon her nose, and then it caught her and spun her as achild's top spins; and upon the palace roof the twelve men looked on insilent helplessness and prayed for the souls of the brave warriors whowere going to their death. And others saw, from Helium's lofty landingstages and from a thousand hangars upon a thousand roofs; but only foran instant did the preparations stop that would send other brave meninto the frightful maelstrom of that apparently hopeless search, forsuch is the courage of the warriors of Barsoom.

  But the Vanator did not fall to the ground, within sight of the city atleast, though as long as the watchers could see her never for aninstant did she rest upon an even keel. Sometimes she lay upon one sideor the other, or again she hurtled along keel up, or rolled over andover, or stood upon her nose or her tail at the caprice of the greatforce that carried her along. And the watchers saw that this great shipwas merely being blown away with the other bits of debris great andsmall that filled the sky. Never in the memory of man or the annals ofrecorded history had such a storm raged across the face of Barsoom.

  And in another instant was the Vanator forgotten as the lofty, scarlettower that had marked Lesser Helium for ages crashed to ground,carrying death and demolition upon the city beneath. Panic reigned. Afire broke out in the ruins. The city's every force seemed crippled,and it was then that The Warlord ordered the men that were about to setforth in search of Tara of Helium to devote their energies to thesalvation of the city, for he too had witnessed the start of theVanator and realized the futility of wasting men who were needed sorelyif Lesser Helium was to be saved from utter destruction.

  Shortly after noon of the second day the storm commenced to abate, andbefore the sun went down, the little craft upon which Tara of Heliumhad hovered between life and death these many hours drifted slowlybefore a gentle breeze above a landscape of rolling hills that once hadbeen lofty mountains upon a Martian continent. The girl was exhaustedfrom loss of sleep, from lack of food and drink, and from the nervousreaction consequent to the terrifying experiences through which she hadpassed. In the near distance, just topping an intervening hill, shecaught a momentary glimpse of what appeared to be a dome-capped tower.Quickly she dropped the flier until the hill shut it off from the viewof the possible occupants of the structure she had seen. The towermeant to her the habitation of man, suggesting the presence of waterand, perhaps, of food. If the tower was the deserted relic of a bygoneage she would scarcely find food there, but there was still a chancethat there might be water. If it was inhabited, then must her approachbe cautious, for only enemies might be expected to abide in so fardistant a land. Tara of Helium knew that she must be far from the twincities of her grandfather's empire, but had she guessed within even athousand haads of the reality, she had been stunned by realization ofthe utter hopelessness of her state.

  Keeping the craft low, for the buoyancy tanks were still intact, thegirl skimmed the ground until the gently-moving wind had carried her tothe side of the last hill that intervened between her and the structureshe had thought a man-built tower. Here she brought the flier to theground among some stunted trees, and dragging it beneath one where itmight be somewhat hidden from craft passing above, she made it fast andset forth to reconnoiter. Like most women of her class she was armedonly with a single slender blade, so that in such an emergency as nowconfronted her she must depend almost solely upon her cleverness inremaining undiscovered by enemies. With utmost caution she crept warilytoward the crest of the hill, taking advantage of every natural screenthat the landscape afforded to conceal her approach from possibleobservers ahead, while momentarily she cast quick glances rearward lestshe be taken by surprise from that quarter.

  She came at last to the summit, where, from the concealment of a lowbush, she could see what lay beyond. Beneath her spread a beautifulvalley surrounded by low hills. Dotting it were numerous circulartowers, dome-capped, and surrounding each tower was a stone wallenclosing several acres of ground. The valley appeared to be in a highstate of cultivation. Upon the opposite side of the hill and justbeneath her was a tower and enclosure. It was the roof of the formerthat had first attracted her attention. In all respects
it seemedidentical in construction with those further out in the valley--a high,plastered wall of massive construction surrounding a similarlyconstructed tower, upon whose gray surface was painted in vivid colorsa strange device. The towers were about forty sofads in diameter,approximately forty earth-feet, and sixty in height to the base of thedome. To an Earth man they would have immediately suggested the silosin which dairy farmers store ensilage for their herds; but closerscrutiny, revealing an occasional embrasured opening together with thestrange construction of the domes, would have altered such aconclusion. Tara of Helium saw that the domes seemed to be faced withinnumerable prisms of glass, those that were exposed to the decliningsun scintillating so gorgeously as to remind her suddenly of themagnificent trappings of Gahan of Gathol. As she thought of the man sheshook her head angrily, and moved cautiously forward a foot or two thatshe might get a less obstructed view of the nearer tower and itsenclosure.

  As Tara of Helium looked down into the enclosure surrounding thenearest tower, her brows contracted momentarily in frowning surprise,and then her eyes went wide in an expression of incredulity tinged withhorror, for what she saw was a score or two of human bodies--naked andheadless. For a long moment she watched, breathless; unable to believethe evidence of her own eyes--that these grewsome things moved and hadlife! She saw them crawling about on hands and knees over and acrossone another, searching about with their fingers. And she saw some ofthem at troughs, for which the others seemed to be searching, and thoseat the troughs were taking something from these receptacles andapparently putting it in a hole where their necks should have been.They were not far beneath her--she could see them distinctly and shesaw that there were the bodies of both men and women, and that theywere beautifully proportioned, and that their skin was similar to hers,but of a slightly lighter red. At first she had thought that she waslooking upon a shambles and that the bodies, but recently decapitated,were moving under the impulse of muscular reaction; but presently sherealized that this was their normal condition. The horror of themfascinated her, so that she could scarce take her eyes from them. Itwas evident from their groping hands that they were eyeless, and theirsluggish movements suggested a rudimentary nervous system and acorrespondingly minute brain. The girl wondered how they subsisted forshe could not, even by the wildest stretch of imagination, picturethese imperfect creatures as intelligent tillers of the soil. Yet thatthe soil of the valley was tilled was evident and that these things hadfood was equally so. But who tilled the soil? Who kept and fed theseunhappy things, and for what purpose? It was an enigma beyond herpowers of deduction.

  The sight of food aroused again a consciousness of her own gnawinghunger and the thirst that parched her throat. She could see both foodand water within the enclosure; but would she dare enter even shouldshe find means of ingress? She doubted it, since the very thought ofpossible contact with these grewsome creatures sent a shudder throughher frame.

  Then her eyes wandered again out across the valley until presently theypicked out what appeared to be a tiny stream winding its way throughthe center of the farm lands--a strange sight upon Barsoom. Ah, if itwere but water! Then might she hope with a real hope, for the fieldswould give her sustenance which she could gain by night, while by dayshe hid among the surrounding hills, and sometime, yes, sometime sheknew, the searchers would come, for John Carter, Warlord of Barsoom,would never cease to search for his daughter until every square haad ofthe planet had been combed again and again. She knew him and she knewthe warriors of Helium and so she knew that could she but manage toescape harm until they came, they would indeed come at last.

  She would have to wait until dark before she dare venture into thevalley, and in the meantime she thought it well to search out a placeof safety nearby where she might be reasonably safe from savage beasts.It was possible that the district was free from carnivora, but onemight never be sure in a strange land. As she was about to withdrawbehind the brow of the hill her attention was again attracted to theenclosure below. Two figures had emerged from the tower. Theirbeautiful bodies seemed identical with those of the headless creaturesamong which they moved, but the newcomers were not headless. Upon theirshoulders were heads that seemed human, yet which the girl intuitivelysensed were not human. They were just a trifle too far away for her tosee them distinctly in the waning light of the dying day, but she knewthat they were too large, they were out of proportion to the perfectlyproportioned bodies, and they were oblate in form. She could see thatthe men wore some manner of harness to which were slung the customarylong-sword and short-sword of the Barsoomian warrior, and that abouttheir short necks were massive leather collars cut to fit closely overthe shoulders and snugly to the lower part of the head. Their featureswere scarce discernible, but there was a suggestion of grotesquenessabout them that carried to her a feeling of revulsion.

  The two carried a long rope to which were fastened, at intervals ofabout two sofads, what she later guessed were light manacles, for shesaw the warriors passing among the poor creatures in the enclosure andabout the right wrist of each they fastened one of the manacles. Whenall had been thus fastened to the rope one of the warriors commenced topull and tug at the loose end as though attempting to drag the headlesscompany toward the tower, while the other went among them with a long,light whip with which he flicked them upon the naked skin. Slowly,dully, the creatures rose to their feet and between the tugging of thewarrior in front and the lashing of him behind the hopeless band wasfinally herded within the tower. Tara of Helium shuddered as she turnedaway. What manner of creatures were these?

  Suddenly it was night. The Barsoomian day had ended, and then the briefperiod of twilight that renders the transition from daylight todarkness almost as abrupt as the switching off of an electric light,and Tara of Helium had found no sanctuary. But perhaps there were nobeasts to fear, or rather to avoid--Tara of Helium liked not the wordfear. She would have been glad, however, had there been a cabin, even avery tiny cabin, upon her small flier; but there was no cabin. Theinterior of the hull was completely taken up by the buoyancy tanks. Ah,she had it! How stupid of her not to have thought of it before! Shecould moor the craft to the tree beneath which it rested and let itrise the length of the rope. Lashed to the deck rings she would then besafe from any roaming beast of prey that chanced along. In the morningshe could drop to the ground again before the craft was discovered.

  As Tara of Helium crept over the brow of the hill down toward thevalley, her presence was hidden by the darkness of the night from thesight of any chance observer who might be loitering by a window in thenearby tower. Cluros, the farther moon, was just rising above thehorizon to commence his leisurely journey through the heavens. Eightzodes later he would set--a trifle over nineteen and a half Earthhours--and during that time Thuria, his vivacious mate, would havecircled the planet twice and be more than half way around on her thirdtrip. She had but just set. It would be more than three and a halfhours before she shot above the opposite horizon to hurtle, swift andlow, across the face of the dying planet. During this temporary absenceof the mad moon Tara of Helium hoped to find both food and water, andgain again the safety of her flier's deck.

  She groped her way through the darkness, giving the tower and itsenclosure as wide a berth as possible. Sometimes she stumbled, for inthe long shadows cast by the rising Cluros objects were grotesquelydistorted though the light from the moon was still not sufficient to beof much assistance to her. Nor, as a matter of fact, did she wantlight. She could find the stream in the dark, by the simple expedientof going down hill until she walked into it and she had seen thatbearing trees and many crops grew throughout the valley, so that shewould pass food in plenty ere she reached the stream. If the moonshowed her the way more clearly and thus saved her from an occasionalfall, he would, too, show her more clearly to the strange denizens ofthe towers, and that, of course, must not be. Could she have waiteduntil the following night conditions would have been better, sinceCluros would not appear in the heavens at all and so, during Thuria'sab
sence, utter darkness would reign; but the pangs of thirst and thegnawing of hunger could be endured no longer with food and drink bothin sight, and so she had decided to risk discovery rather than sufferlonger.

  Safely past the nearest tower, she moved as rapidly as she feltconsistent with safety, choosing her way wherever possible so that shemight take advantage of the shadows of the trees that grew at intervalsand at the same time discover those which bore fruit. In this lattershe met with almost immediate success, for the very third tree beneathwhich she halted was heavy with ripe fruit. Never, thought Tara ofHelium, had aught so delicious impinged upon her palate, and yet it wasnaught else than the almost tasteless usa, which is considered to bepalatable only after having been cooked and highly spiced. It growseasily with little irrigation and the trees bear abundantly. The fruit,which ranks high in food value, is one of the staple foods of the lesswell-to-do, and because of its cheapness and nutritive value forms oneof the principal rations of both armies and navies upon Barsoom, a usewhich has won for it a Martian sobriquet which, freely translated intoEnglish, would be, The Fighting Potato. The girl was wise enough to eatbut sparingly, but she filled her pocket-pouch with the fruit beforeshe continued upon her way.

  Two towers she passed before she came at last to the stream, and hereagain was she temperate, drinking but little and that very slowly,contenting herself with rinsing her mouth frequently and bathing herface, her hands, and her feet; and even though the night was cold, asMartian nights are, the sensation of refreshment more than compensatedfor the physical discomfort of the low temperature. Replacing hersandals she sought among the growing track near the stream for whateveredible berries or tubers might be planted there, and found a couple ofvarieties that could be eaten raw. With these she replaced some of theusa in her pocket-pouch, not only to insure a variety but because shefound them more palatable. Occasionally she returned to the stream todrink, but each time moderately. Always were her eyes and ears alertfor the first signs of danger, but she had neither seen nor heard aughtto disturb her. And presently the time approached when she felt shemust return to her flier lest she be caught in the revealing light oflow swinging Thuria. She dreaded leaving the water for she knew thatshe must become very thirsty before she could hope to come again to thestream. If she only had some little receptacle in which to carry water,even a small amount would tide her over until the following night; butshe had nothing and so she must content herself as best she could withthe juices of the fruit and tubers she had gathered.

  After a last drink at the stream, the longest and deepest she hadallowed herself, she rose to retrace her steps toward the hills; buteven as she did so she became suddenly tense with apprehension. Whatwas that? She could have sworn that she saw something move in theshadows beneath a tree not far away. For a long minute the girl did notmove--she scarce breathed. Her eyes remained fixed upon the denseshadows below the tree, her ears strained through the silence of thenight. A low moaning came down from the hills where her flier washidden. She knew it well--the weird note of the hunting banth. And thegreat carnivore lay directly in her path. But he was not so close asthis other thing, hiding there in the shadows just a little way off.What was it? It was the strain of uncertainty that weighed heaviestupon her. Had she known the nature of the creature lurking there halfits menace would have vanished. She cast quickly about her in search ofsome haven of refuge should the thing prove dangerous.

  Again arose the moaning from the hills, but this time closer. Almostimmediately it was answered from the opposite side of the valley,behind her, and then from the distance to the right of her, and twiceupon her left. Her eyes had found a tree, quite near. Slowly, andwithout taking her eyes from the shadows of that other tree, she movedtoward the overhanging branches that might afford her sanctuary in theevent of need, and at her first move a low growl rose from the spot shehad been watching and she heard the sudden moving of a big body.Simultaneously the creature shot into the moonlight in full charge uponher, its tail erect, its tiny ears laid flat, its great mouth with itsmultiple rows of sharp and powerful fangs already yawning for its prey,its ten legs carrying it forward in great leaps, and now from thebeast's throat issued the frightful roar with which it seeks toparalyze its prey. It was a banth--the great, maned lion of Barsoom.Tara of Helium saw it coming and leaped for the tree toward which shehad been moving, and the banth realized her intention and redoubled hisspeed. As his hideous roar awakened the echoes in the hills, so too itawakened echoes in the valley; but these echoes came from the livingthroats of others of his kind, until it seemed to the girl that Fatehad thrown her into the midst of a countless multitude of these savagebeasts.

  Almost incredibly swift is the speed of a charging banth, and fortunateit was that the girl had not been caught farther in the open. As itwas, her margin of safety was next to negligible, for as she swungnimbly to the lower branches the creature in pursuit of her crashedamong the foliage almost upon her as it sprang upward to seize her. Itwas only a combination of good fortune and agility that saved her. Astout branch deflected the raking talons of the carnivore, but so closewas the call that a giant forearm brushed her flesh in the instantbefore she scrambled to the higher branches.

  Baffled, the banth gave vent to his rage and disappointment in a seriesof frightful roars that caused the very ground to tremble, and to thesewere added the roarings and the growlings and the moanings of hisfellows as they approached from every direction, in the hope ofwresting from him whatever of his kill they could take by craft orprowess. And now he turned snarling upon them as they circled the tree,while the girl, huddled in a crotch above them, looked down upon thegaunt, yellow monsters padding on noiseless feet in a restless circleabout her. She wondered now at the strange freak of fate that hadpermitted her to come down this far into the valley by night unharmed,but even more she wondered how she was to return to the hills. She knewthat she would not dare venture it by night and she guessed, too, thatby day she might be confronted by even graver perils. To depend uponthis valley for sustenance she now saw to be beyond the pale ofpossibility because of the banths that would keep her from food andwater by night, while the dwellers in the towers would doubtless makeit equally impossible for her to forage by day. There was but onesolution of her difficulty and that was to return to her flier and praythat the wind would waft her to some less terrorful land; but whenmight she return to the flier? The banths gave little evidence ofrelinquishing hope of her, and even if they wandered out of sight wouldshe dare risk the attempt? She doubted it.

  Hopeless indeed seemed her situation--hopeless it was.