A breathless silence hung over the banked crowds. They might have been dead men watching. Then a trumpet blasted and a murmur as of rising wind swept them and, behind him, Wan Tengri heard the snarl of a starving beast. He sprang a full three yards forward, whirled to land lightly, facing the sound. In the base of the altar, a door had swung open and, in that square of darkness, there crouched his gaudily striped opponent for the battle of the beasts, a tiger.
For an instant, the beast hunkered close to the sand, blinking its great gleaming eyes against the brilliant light. Then it sighted the man, and its saber-fanged jaws parted in a roar that dwarfed the multiple voice of the mob. Wan Tengri, poised lightly on the sand, stood motionless to wait the charge. The brazen chain that was his only weapon swung lightly against the taut muscles of his thigh. Before this, he had faced the charge of the tiger of the plains, when the month-long Mongol hunts reached the
gurtai
and the circle of the drive was closed for the slaughter. But always then he had carried a lance in his hand and his keen sword hung ready at his side. Yet there was keenness rather than fear in his alert gray eyes, and the smile still curved his solid lips.
Three slow, crouching steps, the tiger had taken forward, belly close to the ground. Now the haunches were setting their muscles for the charge. The great silken tail was stiff as brass, save that its black tip twitched just a little. And still Wan Tengri did not move. He could feel the breathless waiting of the crowd. The little breeze that had brushed the arena was quiet in sympathy—and Wan Tengri waited.
The mask of the tiger contracted. Its roar burst out, deep and hoarse, a terrifying weapon in itself. Wan Tengri’s throat opened in an answering shout of defiance and, as the tiger released the taut springs of its thighs, launching into the air, Wan Tengri charged! His forward leap disconcerted the beast in the moment of its attack. Prey did not behave thus. Prey fled from beneath outreaching talons. The powerful forelegs of the tiger were spread wide, the six-inch claws reaching for a grip that would rend a man’s head from his body, yet its charge was half broken. It twisted in mid-leap as Wan Tengri feinted toward his right. It was no more than a sway of his swiftly lunging body, yet it served its purpose, and when he flung himself violently to the left, crouching low beneath the outward sweep of those deadly talons, the tiger could not reach him. How closely Wan Tengri had calculated even he did not guess until he felt the brush of the beast’s silky foreleg across his chest as he pivoted. Wan Tengri’s right arm was winging through the air. The brass chain caught the glint of the sun in a golden streak of fire and then the manacles struck home in the tiger’s face!
For a breath of time, Wan Tengri was motionless, then he allowed the impetus of his giant’s blow to carry him forward, across the tiger’s flank. The beast roared out a gust of pain and fury and, in the instant it landed, whirled and pounced on the spot where a moment before the man had stood—and Wan Tengri was not there. Once more, just beyond the reach of the beast’s claws, he swung his brassy flail. He had a breathless glimpse of the snarling mask as he struck the second time, then he was running across the arena with great leaping strides. He heard the howl of the tiger and the vicious snapping of its teeth; caught the violence of its bounding feet as it struck the earth.
There was no time to look behind him. Five long strides Wan Tengri took, then pivoted on a single thrust of his stiffened left leg and doubled aside from his trail. The tiger blundered on, roaring, tearing up the black sand in clouds, a tawny fury, a maddened, slaughterous beast—but almost helpless. For Wan Tengri’s flail had struck true and both those amber eyes were blinded. Its own blood ran down into its nostrils to cloud the natively weak sense of smell as still it sought its prey. The tiger’s roars shook the air, but the sound was beaten down, submerged in the frantic applause that burst from ten thousand human throats. It struck the tiger with terror. Blindly, it cringed to the sands, snarling in its throat but cowed by this greater ferocity of the human beast.
Wan Tengri checked for a moment, poised on his toes, then flung himself forward in a furious sprint. There was grimness on his face. That beast might be cowed, but there was still death for a dozen men in those saber claws and awful teeth. Yet the tiger must be finished. Without doubt, there would be more beasts loosed upon him. This terror could not be free to rend when he needed all his wits and strength for another battle. Straight toward the tiger he ran, and still the brazen links swung from his fist. He leaped high into the air—and landed astride the tiger’s back!
Behind the powerful forelegs, his knees clamped home, locked beneath the beast’s belly. In the same instant, he had snapped the brazen chain beneath the furry throat. His fists locked on the links and, with all the power of his mighty shoulders, he strained upward on the chain, twisting it, knotting it behind the wicked head. In the first instant of his leap, the tiger sprang high into the air, all four claws striking out at once. It fell on its side, rolled frantically—and made no sound.
Wan Tengri’s breath was driven out of him by the savage violence of that leap, but his legs clung with bitter strength to the hold that made the difference between life and death. Both hands were locked in the chain and, while man and beast rolled and tumbled on the ground, he twisted and twisted again the garrote knot he had tied, strangling the tiger. Sunlight and blackness wheeled in his brain. Muscles like brass quivered and jerked beneath his legs, and he was pounded on earth again, and yet again, until there was no vision in his eyes, no breath in his body—but the tiger made no sound.
He could feel the frantic pumping of those mighty lungs. The hammer of the tiger’s laboring heart thudded against his left thigh. That pounding became swift as the drum of horses’ racing hoofs. It became a war club that almost battered Wan Tengri’s desperate grip loose. Then, it began to slow, and the struggles of the tiger slowed, too. A final, frantic spring that tossed Wan Tengri a dozen feet, and the tiger leaped convulsively and was still.
Wan Tengri staggered to his feet. The arena was wheeling about him and his breath surged in his chest. Roar upon roar of applause beat upon his eardrums. He sought for and found the motionless body of the tiger and moved toward it on feet that seemed strangely numb beneath him, but already his keen brain was working. In his struggles with the tiger, he had approached within a half dozen paces of the scarlet gate. While he had fought, the scarlet-clad guards and the priests had ducked behind the brass grating that closed the exit, but now they were filing back. Beyond them, Bourtai had said, a horse would be waiting. But Wan Tengri’s resolution was already formed. Escape waited there, just beyond these cowardly fools in red. Presently, he might claim it, but first he had a score to pay. His eyes swung toward the altar where dead Kassar lay. The door in its base was open, and this time it was two black-maned lions that paused, bewildered on the threshold! Bitter laughter stirred in Wan Tengri’s dry throat. No wonder that, in seventeen years, no man had survived the three battles!
With the swiftness of an arrow flicking through a beam of light, he had made his plan. He stooped over the carcass of the tiger, and the bronzed flesh of his shoulders corded and rippled as his mighty muscles came into play. An instant he tensed there, then the tiger was lifted high over his head. In the same instant, he took a quick running step and heaved it—straight into the faces of the red guards!
The same leaping stride that had hurled the beast sent Wan Tengri racing toward them. There were muffled shouts and a hurried attempt to dodge. One man futilely snatched out his sword. Then the great tawny hulk of the tiger struck among them. Two men went down screaming. The man who had drawn his sword tried to leap under the carcass, tripped and sprawled full length on the sands. Even as he hit, Wan Tengri was on him. His knees gouged into the taut, arched back. His two hands locked beneath the chin. An explosive release of the power in his body, and the guard’s thin scream quavered out, strangled and cut short when his neck snapped.
With scarcely a pause, Wan Tengri snatched the man’s heavy, curved sword from the sand and was lunging across the arena. Behind him, he heard the fierce shouts of the scattered guard and a sharp command as the captain closed their ranks. Wan Tengri laughed as he ran.
“You will get your chance presently, you who call yourselves men! After the Battle of the Beasts—”
The lions had sighted him and were crouching out from the darkness of the doorway. Their sides were gaunt with starvation, and there was white slaver on their fangs. They swung their heads heavily from side to side and a coughing roar began in the chest of the larger beast. Wan Tengri did not check his race across the arena. He answered that bestial challenge with a shout that rang against the crowded ranks of the amphitheater.
For an instant, the two beasts crouched, undecided in the face of this man who charged with a scream as savage as their own. The smaller lion cringed back against the altar base, but, after that momentary hesitation, the second, larger beast roared again—and charged to the attack. Straight at each other, across an ever-narrowing stretch of the black sand, man and beast raced. In silence now, a silence that gripped the waiting crowd, that stopped breath in their throats for a timeless pause. Then, with a final, vaunting roar, the lion launched itself into the air. Its claws caught gleams of light, reaching for the taut, rendable skin of the man.
Using the speed of his charge, Wan Tengri swerved aside as he had leaped from the tiger’s path, and this time, when his arm swung, it carried keen, murderous steel. It was not so fine as his own lost scimitar, but with the skill of a warrior’s arm, he drew it home as the curving edge bit into flesh and bone. The lion dropped limply to earth, and did not stir. Its almost-severed head sagged, curiously limp. Its severed spinal cord brought death without a quiver!
With that stroke, Wan Tengri spun on his heel. He made a complete turn and, as the maneuver finished, he was charging down upon the second lion! For a moment only, the beast stood against the screaming challenge that Wan Tengri sounded, then it turned tail and slunk back into the darkness from which it had come. Laughter mingled with the shout of approbation that roared from the mob and, from the top-most rank, a blast of trumpets sent their brazen notes across the tempest of sound. The door in the base of the altar swung shut and Wan Tengri stood, an erect statue of bronze, gleaming and metallic with sweat, against the white alabaster. Greedily, he sucked air into the barrel of his chest. His arms swung ready at his sides and, once, he lifted the sword point to weigh its balance in his hand. There was a frown furrowing his forehead. It would serve.
His brain was empty of sensation. There was no weariness in him. He was warming to the slaughter. A second blast of the trumpets beat upon his ears, and his fiery head pivoted, his red beard thrust out fiercely. That Battle of the Beasts was ended; the Battle of the Men about to begin. A contemptuous smile curved the straight, stiff line of his mouth. Marching toward him were seven fools in motley, seven guards who wore each the brilliant livery of his master. But the one who wore scarlet was more eager. There was a thrust to his shoulders, and a stiff determination to the way he carried his head. Wan Tengri nodded. He dragged the flat of the blade along his thigh, cleansing it of beast blood. There would be blood enough presently, and it was slippery stuff when it trickled down to wet a man’s palm on the hilt.
On came the seven, sun glinting on cuirass and helmet, on the embossed shields they slung on their arms. Wan Tengri’s eyes were narrow with calculation. One advantage he had, and one only. A naked man could move more swiftly than a soldier cumbered with armor. He would deal with them—if there were no enchantments. He stood, solidly braced on his feet, to await their coming. As if he intended to stand as firm as that alabaster altar. He could see the grim set of those clean-shaven faces.
Phagh!
They looked like priests. Wan Tengri spat contemptuously on the sand. As if he had given a command, the seven swords flashed out of their scabbards and the men formed a semicircle to hem him against the altar base. Slowly then, cautiously then, they paced forward, shields ready on their left arms, sword points reaching—
Wan Tengri spat again. “Red,” he said deliberately, “must be the color of cowards here!”
With a furious shout, the scarlet guard hurled himself forward. His curved sword glittered aloft in a high arc. Wan Tengri moved like the lithe leap of a tiger. He made no effort to ward the blow. As he darted forward, he thrust out his sword like a spear, point toward that eager, shouting throat. Then a cry rose futilely to the lips of Prester John. Enchantment, by all the curses of Ahriman! His sword, the valiant sword that had sliced off a lion’s head at a blow—had changed to a serpent in his fist!
VI
PRESTER JOHN could feel the cold, writhing muscles of the serpent as it twisted and coiled in an effort to sink fangs into his hand. There was a triumphant shout in the throat of the red guard, and his glittering blade started its downward swing at the fiery unprotected head. The other six men were pivoting, forming two ranks of three each to crush him between the vicious tongues of their swords, beneath the weight of the shields. Death was very close; death by enchantment.
Prester John had fought coolly and with calculation up to this moment, but now he felt surging through his veins the joyous battle rage that had earned him his terrible name. He shouted, a hoarse and inarticulate challenge. His right arm circled over his head and struck like the lightnings of that same hurricane whose name he bore. Straightened by the fury of that swing, the snake’s head snapped against the face of the red guard! There was a thin, rising shriek. The man’s sword faltered in its lethal sweep and, bounding on unshod feet, Prester John ducked under it and was behind his enemy.
He did not check there to finish the man from behind, but with two great leaps was beyond the swift closing of those twin ranks of death. The black guard tried to block his escape with a long leap and a flickering thrust of his sword point, but his armor weighed him down. His feet lifted heavily from the ground, and Prester John flashed past, checked and flung the serpent with its shattered head squarely at the scowling darkness of the black guard’s face. The man’s shield came up to ward it, and Prester John heard a clash as of metal striking tempered metal.
There was no time to think of the meaning of that sound, but the memory lingered in Prester John’s mind as he hurled his bronze-gleaming body into action. While the black guard was blinded by the swift lifting of that shield, Wan Tengri leaped in past the groping of the outthrust sword point, and his two hands locked on the man’s wrist. He used the impetus of his violent charge and the towering strength of his brass-thewed body—and he used the wrestling skill he had learned among the Mongols. He wrenched the black guard’s sword arm over his shoulder and with a smooth forward sweep of his trunk, lifted the man clear of the ground and hurled him squarely on the sword and shield of the next guard!
In an instant, he had scooped up the sword of the black guard and had taken a half dozen swift leaps in retreat. He whirled then to peer back at his enemies and his sword made a whistling arc about his head.
“What, do you delay?” he cried, and mocked them with his deep laughter. “Has something robbed your hearts of blood? Or are your feet planted to the ground by enchantment?”
It was only then he saw that the red guard lay motionless while blood from beneath his throat was drunk eagerly by the thirsty sands. The guard in silvery livery was wrestling to free his sword, deep-buried in the body of the black. So only four men gripped shield and sword and ran heavily to oppose him. Prester John smiled to see them come so weightily to the attack. The muscles in his thighs felt taut and eager and laughter worked in his throat. He could hear the constant roaring of the arena crowds and, carelessly, he turned his back upon the approaching soldiers and lifted his captured blade in salute.
“A moment more,” he cried, “and I will show you some real waging of battles. Trumpet in your gods!”
That gesture almost cost Prester John his life. As he swung about, a heavy dagger flickered past. He felt its cool, stinging kiss upon his cheek, and the blade tangled with his fiery, shoulder-length hair and clung there. He saw that the golden guard had thrown it.
“Well thrown, fool in gold!” he cried. “For that I will kill thee last!” He dashed the warm blood from his cheek, and his left hand wrapped about the dagger hilt. The four were almost upon him. In two leaps, he had turned their left flank and was charging, with a warning roar, upon the silver guard who still wrestled with his corpse-locked sword. The man saw him coming and, with a final frantic wrench, freed his weapon and fell on guard, shield protecting belly and chest.
Just out of his reach, Prester John checked and saw the sword swing up for a death stroke. John flung himself forward—and something gripped at his feet to plump him awkwardly to his knees! Desperately, his sword reached out, cutting edge uppermost. Its tip flickered across the armor-bare armpit, and red blood gushed to answer the caress of the steel. Sword toppled down from nerveless fingers and the arm dropped like a stick. The guard struck out fiercely with his shield, but his strength was pouring from him with the red staining of his silver tunic. His knees buckled and he groveled, dying, within reach of Prester John’s hand.
Pallor touched the cheeks of Prester John. The blood from his cheek dripped from his fiery beard to dabble his swelling chest. He thrust fiercely to his feet—and they were sunk to the ankles in sand! He wrenched at them and, with a gasp of relief, he felt them tear free of the grip of the earth—but at his next stride he sank ankle-deep again! Even more heavily than the armored men he moved with this new accursed enchantment. Yet his lips could curve in his battle smile! Laboriously, he turned to face the charge of the four guards who remained alive. Glittering in their brass, resplendent in their tunics of blue and green, purple and gold, and with grimly confident smiles on their lips, they came in steadily. Sword points gleamed beneath the rims of their shields.
Prester John took two slow backward steps so that he stood once more against the altar. He made an awesome figure with the red sword in his hand, with his bloody beard and the smeared gleaming trunk of his body and, though ankle-deep in the black sand, still he towered above his four enemies. They were coming in steadily, side by side, a semicircle of death in brass and steel. The crowds were silent and the burning pressure of the sunlight struck dazzlingly from the gleaming white of the altar, framed the bronze Barbarian in a halo of exquisite flame.
“Come, my fine slaughterers,” Prester John said gently. “Come and let me kiss thee with steel.”
There was an answering smile on the faces of the men, but they were wary with death and there was grimness in the taut lines of their cheeks, a fierce keenness in their watching eyes. Prester John’s smile widened. They were close enough. His sword flickered toward the face of the blue guard. The shield came up—and Prester John’s left hand threw the dagger! Straight and true, it drew its silvery line through the metallic sunlight and grated home under the edge of the cuirass. Its keen steel was buried to the hilt in the guard’s thigh joint where a great artery pulsed close to the skin.
With a scream, the blue guard pitched forward, doubling, and he lashed out in a frantic side stroke with his waiting sword. Forgetful of the restraining sand, Prester John tried to fling himself aside and, too late, swung a fending blade. There was the rasp of steel, but when Prester John’s shoulders struck the altar, there was blood upon his thigh. Fury bellowed from his throat. Heedless of the restraining sand, he flung himself upon the three guards who remained. His sword clashed on brazen shield. His shield severed under the stroke. The purple guard leaped backward. Green and gold closed in from two sides. Their swords flashed high. In a great circle about his head, Prester John whirled his blade. The golden crest leaped from a helmet and that guard’s sword shattered in the air, but the second man’s blade was under, slashing home. Prester John dropped to one knee and shrank aside. His sword cut back at the guard in green, and the man’s fist, still gripping savagely the hilt of a sword, bounced on the ground.
From a half dozen cubits away, the purple guard hurled his dagger. There was no time to dodge but the skill of Prester John, whose sword had severed arrows in midflight, swung his steel in exquisite timing. The dagger hissed on harmlessly to ring like a bell against the altar stone. And now, purple guard and golden drew back while the man in green gripped the blood-spurting stump of his arm and staggered off across the black sands.
Somewhere, a trumpet blared and an arrow flicked from the barrier. The green guard groaned with the bite of the shaft, pitched to earth, and the twang of the bow, coming lately, marked the grinding of his face into the sand.
Prester John, surging once more to his feet, smiled bitterly. It was a stern discipline that held the guard. They must triumph—or die. Gold and purple guards were rearming from the bodies of slain comrades, and Prester John moved toward them with ponderous, ankle-deep steps. The guards hovered back, reluctant to close, and twice the swift sword batted aside flung daggers. From the barriers, a trumpet sounded warning of more disciplining arrows. Pale-faced, the men glanced toward the sound, then gripped their swords in desperate hands and came forward to meet Prester John.
He did not check his march. With each step, his mighty thighs flexed and the muscles leaped like living serpents beneath the flesh. And at each step, the thirsty black sands drank of his blood. There was no smile on his mouth, and his teeth gleamed fiercely through the fire bristle of his beard. He stooped once to snatch up a dead man’s shield, and once more he was aware of the timeless, blood-hungry waiting of the mob. The crowd recognized that tricks and flight were through. The odds were even for Prester John, two men to his mighty strength. No quarter, no more delay. The guards sensed that bitter threat and stood unmoving, shields poised. The man in purple shifted his grip on sword hilt a little Prester John saw the light quiver on its point. Five cubits’ distance from them, Prester John paused.
“Man in gold,” he said softly, “I promised you should die last for that shrewd dagger throw of thine. Purple man—”
No man could see the tensing of Prester John’s muscle that hurled the shield from his left hand. It was as sudden as the release of a bowstring. Like the twang of the gut, too, was the clash of the shield striking into the helmeted head of the golden guard! And its force was the force of the hammer of the gods! The guard pitched sideways, staggering to the earth, and Prester John tossed his war shout to the vault of the heavens, tore his feet from the sand and hurled himself upon the purple guard!
For an instant, steel rang on brass, clashed and slithered against another blade. For an instant, heavy-footed men stood, slashing, face to face. Then the lion roar of Prester John’s shout burst out again and his sword, an arc of light in the hammering sun, cut through the upthrust rim of the brazen shield and leaped on. His shoulders were hunched by the thrust of his muscles; his whole titan’s body bent to the stroke. The sword flashed clear, and for a breath of time the two bodies stood there in confrontation, and afterward the crowd saw what had happened. A head, still cased in a purple-crested helmet, was tumbling like an awkward ball upon the sand!
With a brusque thrust of his hand, Prester John tumbled the blood-spouting trunk backward and turned heavily toward the man in gold, who still weaved dizzily on his feet.
“Come and die,” said Prester John.
The golden guard lifted his sword in salute. “Nay, brother,” he said clearly. “Thou shall live for all of me. Remember this, when we meet in some other life, and call me ‘comrade’:
Thou art the man!”
He slammed his sword into its scabbard, swung about and, as steadily as a sentry, head high, shield at rest, he marched back toward the barrier, toward the trumpet and the arrow of his death.
“Two battles have been waged,” Prester John muttered in his bloody beard. He stood on braced, rigid legs, his mighty shoulders bowed, not as beneath a load, but in menace and in power. He was aware now that purple shadows were crawling across the western rim of the black arena, had shaded in kindness the inverted face of Kassar. He twisted his head to smile up at the corpse of his blood brother.
“A few drops of thy blood are avenged, my brother,” he said. He drew back his heavy shoulders and lifted his sword so that it glittered, red and ominous, in the diminishing sun.
“Send out your gods!” he bellowed at the mob, “or does their purple blood shrink from the caress of Prester John?”
There was a whisper like the stir of the Flame Wind and to the ears of the waiting man they seemed to form an echo of the golden guard’s last words:
“Thou art the man!”
Prester John frowned in impatience. What that whisper meant he did not know, but his battle-heated limbs were stiffening. He swung the sword, dragged his heavy feet once more toward the altar whose pure white was smeared with scarlet. His gray eyes, sunken under the frown of his brows, probed toward the Red Gate where Bourtai had said, a horse was waiting. Well, he would never reach it. The gods were coming, and the priests of scarlet and blue and gold, of green and silver and purple and black, would add their strength to the arm of their gods. Prester John flexed his sword in his hands, and it snapped clean in half. He shrugged and stooped for another weapon. He sprung it and, when he released the point, it quivered and sang in his hand. Briefly, Prester John smiled. He flung up his blood-crowned head and once more the trumpets blared. The third battle was begun!
Prester John glanced briefly toward the door in the altar, but it was sealed tightly, nor did any man issue from the gates in the barrier. He frowned, feeling the pressure of the waiting throng, and then his eyes widened and short, harsh laughter leaped from his chest. From the bloodstains on the sand, tiny, pure-white flames were licking up! Even as he watched, the flames began to run together, and as each new tongue joined, the central core leaped higher and hotter, until its center was a blinding rod of radiance. He could hear the snap and crackle of the fire burning straight up in the motionless air, straight up until it towered twice the height of the bronze giant who waited with a thing of feeble manmade steel in his hand and dauntless courage in his gray eyes.
In the wake of the flames, the clothing of the guards was smoldering. Black threads of smoke lifted and Prester John’s nostrils widened to the odor of scorching flesh, of fusing, blood-drenched sand. Stately and beautiful, this magic fire swirled before him and then, slowly, with the deliberation of marching men, it swayed toward Prester John. He gripped the steel hard in his fist. In his heart was no longer any hope, yet what man could do against this manifestation of the gods he would do! His left hand lifted and touched the bauble that still dangled about his throat, the bit of the True Cross and, briefly, a grim smile touched his lips.