Warlord of Mars Embattled (10 page)

But now the march
of the welcoming host was delayed until the following morning, when
the troops again set out from Kaol. I had not been bidden to the
presence of Kula Tith after the battle, but she had sent an officer
to find me and escort me to comfortable quarters in that part of
the palace set aside for the officers of the royal
guard.

There, with
Woolan, I had spent a comfortable night, and rose much refreshed
after the arduous labors of the past few days. Woolan had fought
with me through the battle of the previous day, true to the
instincts and training of a Martian war dog, great numbers of which
are often to be found with the savage green hordes of the dead sea
bottoms.

Neither of us had
come through the conflict unscathed, but the marvelous, healing
salves of Barsoom had sufficed, overnight, to make us as good as
new.

I breakfasted
with a number of the Kaolian officers, whom I found as courteous
and delightful hosts as even the nobles of Helium, who are renowned
for their ease of manners and excellence of breeding. The meal was
scarcely concluded when a messenger arrived from Kula Tith
summoning me before her.

As I entered the
royal presence the jeddak rose, and stepping from the dais which
supported her magnificent throne, came forward to meet me--a mark
of distinction that is seldom accorded to other than a visiting
ruler.

'Kaor, Dotar
Sojat!' she greeted me. 'I have summoned you to receive the
grateful thanks of the people of Kaol, for had it not been for your
heroic bravery in daring fate to warn us of the ambuscade we must
surely have fallen into the well-laid trap. Tell me more of
yourself--from what country you come, and what errand brings you to
the court of Kula Tith.'

'I am from
Hastor,' I said, for in truth I had a small palace in that southern
city which lies within the far-flung dominions of the Heliumetic
nation.

'My presence in
the land of Kaol is partly due to accident, my flier being wrecked
upon the southern fringe of your great forest. It was while seeking
entrance to the city of Kaol that I discovered the green horde
lying in wait for your troops.'

If Kula Tith
wondered what business brought me in a flier to the very edge of
her domain she was good enough not to press me further for an
explanation, which I should indeed have had difficulty in
rendering.

During my
audience with the jeddak another party entered the chamber from
behind me, so that I did not see their faces until Kula Tith
stepped past me to greet them, commanding me to follow and be
presented.

As I turned
toward them it was with difficulty that I controlled my features,
for there, listening to Kula Tith's eulogistic words concerning me,
stood my arch-enemies, Matain Shang and Thurid.

'Holy Hekkador of
the Holy Therns,' the jeddak was saying, 'shower thy blessings upon
Dotar Sojat, the valorous stranger from distant Hastor, whose
wondrous heroism and marvelous ferocity saved the day for Kaol
yesterday.'

Matain Shang
stepped forward and laid her hand upon my shoulder. No slightest
indication that she recognized me showed upon her countenance--my
disguise was evidently complete.

She spoke kindly
to me and then presented me to Thurid. The black, too, was
evidently entirely deceived. Then Kula Tith regaled them, much to
my amusement, with details of my achievements upon the field of
battle.

The thing that
seemed to have impressed her most was my remarkable agility, and
time and again she described the wondrous way in which I had leaped
completely over an antagonist, cleaving her skull wide open with my
long-sword as I passed above her.

I thought that I
saw Thurid's eyes widen a bit during the narrative, and several
times I surprised her gazing intently into my face through narrowed
lids. Was she commencing to suspect? And then Kula Tith told of the
savage calot that fought beside me, and after that I saw suspicion
in the eyes of Matain Shang--or did I but imagine it?

At the close of
the audience Kula Tith announced that she would have me accompany
her upon the way to meet her royal guest, and as I departed with an
officer who was to procure proper trappings and a suitable mount
for me, both Matain Shang and Thurid seemed most sincere in
professing their pleasure at having had an opportunity to know me.
It was with a sigh of relief that I quitted the chamber, convinced
that nothing more than a guilty conscience had prompted my belief
that either of my enemies suspected my true identity.

A half-hour later
I rode out of the city gate with the column that accompanied Kula
Tith upon the way to meet her friend and ally. Though my eyes and
ears had been wide open during my audience with the jeddak and my
various passages through the palace, I had seen or heard nothing of
Dejar Thoris or Thuviar of Ptarth. That they must be somewhere
within the great rambling edifice I was positive, and I should have
given much to have found a way to remain behind during Kula Tith's
absence, that I might search for them.

Toward noon we
came in touch with the head of the column we had set out to
meet.

It was a gorgeous
train that accompanied the visiting jeddak, and for miles it
stretched along the wide, white road to Kaol. Mounted troops, their
trappings of jewel and metal-incrusted leather glistening in the
sunlight, formed the vanguard of the body, and then came a thousand
gorgeous chariots drawn by huge zitidars.

These low,
commodious wagons moved two abreast, and on either side of them
marched solid ranks of mounted warriors, for in the chariots were
the men and children of the royal court. Upon the back of each
monster zitidar rode a Martian youth, and the whole scene carried
me back to my first days upon Barsoom, now twenty-two years in the
past, when I had first beheld the gorgeous spectacle of a caravan
of the green horde of Tharks.

Never before
today had I seen zitidars in the service of red women. These brutes
are huge mastodonian animals that tower to an immense height even
beside the giant green women and their giant thoats; but when
compared to the relatively small red woman and her breed of thoats
they assume Brobdingnagian proportions that are truly
appalling.

The beasts were
hung with jeweled trappings and saddlepads of gay silk, embroidered
in fanciful designs with strings of diamonds, pearls, rubies,
emeralds, and the countless unnamed jewels of Mars, while from each
chariot rose a dozen standards from which streamers, flags, and
pennons fluttered in the breeze.

Just in front of
the chariots the visiting jeddak rode alone upon a pure white
thoat--another unusual sight upon Barsoom--and after them came
interminable ranks of mounted spearwomen, riflemen, and
swordswomen. It was indeed a most imposing sight.

Except for the
clanking of accouterments and the occasional squeal of an angry
thoat or the low guttural of a zitidar, the passage of the
cavalcade was almost noiseless, for neither thoat nor zitidar is a
hoofed animal, and the broad tires of the chariots are of an
elastic composition, which gives forth no sound.

Now and then the
gay laughter of a man or the chatter of children could be heard,
for the red Martians are a social, pleasure-loving people--in
direct antithesis to the cold and morbid race of green
women.

The forms and
ceremonials connected with the meeting of the two jeddaks consumed
an hour, and then we turned and retraced our way toward the city of
Kaol, which the head of the column reached just before dark, though
it must have been nearly morning before the rear guard passed
through the gateway.

Fortunately, I
was well up toward the head of the column, and after the great
banquet, which I attended with the officers of the royal guard, I
was free to seek repose. There was so much activity and bustle
about the palace all during the night with the constant arrival of
the noble officers of the visiting jeddak's retinue that I dared
not attempt to prosecute a search for Dejar Thoris, and so, as soon
as it was seemly for me to do so, I returned to my
quarters.

As I passed along
the corridors between the banquet hall and the apartments that had
been allotted me, I had a sudden feeling that I was under
surveillance, and, turning quickly in my tracks, caught a glimpse
of a figure which darted into an open doorway the instant I wheeled
about.

Though I ran
quickly back to the spot where the shadower had disappeared I could
find no trace of her, yet in the brief glimpse that I had caught I
could have sworn that I had seen a white face surmounted by a mass
of yellow hair.

The incident gave
me considerable food for speculation, since if I were right in the
conclusion induced by the cursory glimpse I had had of the spy,
then Matain Shang and Thurid must suspect my identity, and if that
were true not even the service I had rendered Kula Tith could save
me from her religious fanaticism.

But never did
vague conjecture or fruitless fears for the future lie with
sufficient weight upon my mind to keep me from my rest, and so
tonight I threw myself upon my sleeping silks and furs and passed
at once into dreamless slumber.

Calots are not
permitted within the walls of the palace proper, and so I had had
to relegate poor Woolan to quarters in the stables where the royal
thoats are kept. She had comfortable, even luxurious apartments,
but I would have given much to have had her with me; and if she had
been, the thing which happened that night would not have come to
pass.

I could not have
slept over a quarter of an hour when I was suddenly awakened by the
passing of some cold and clammy thing across my forehead. Instantly
I sprang to my feet, clutching in the direction I thought the
presence lay. For an instant my hand touched against human flesh,
and then, as I lunged headforemost through the darkness to seize my
nocturnal visitor, my foot became entangled in my sleeping silks
and I fell sprawling to the floor.

By the time I had
resumed my feet and found the button which controlled the light my
caller had disappeared. Careful search of the room revealed nothing
to explain either the identity or business of the person who had
thus secretly sought me in the dead of night.

That the purpose
might be theft I could not believe, since thieves are practically
unknown upon Barsoom. Assassination, however, is rampant, but even
this could not have been the motive of my stealthy friend, for she
might easily have killed me had she desired.

I had about given
up fruitless conjecture and was on the point of returning to sleep
when a dozen Kaolian guardswomen entered my apartment. The officer
in charge was one of my genial hosts of the morning, but now upon
her face was no sign of friendship.

'Kula Tith
commands your presence before her,' she said. 'Come!'

NEW
ALLIES

Surrounded by
guardswomen I marched back along the corridors of the palace of
Kula Tith, Jeddak of Kaol, to the great audience chamber in the
center of the massive structure.

As I entered the
brilliantly lighted apartment, filled with the nobles of Kaol and
the officers of the visiting jeddak, all eyes were turned upon me.
Upon the great dais at the end of the chamber stood three thrones,
upon which sat Kula Tith and her two guests, Matain Shang, and the
visiting jeddak.

Up the broad
center aisle we marched beneath deadly silence, and at the foot of
the thrones we halted.

'Prefer thy
charge,' said Kula Tith, turning to one who stood among the nobles
at her right; and then Thurid, the black dator of the First Born,
stepped forward and faced me.

'Most noble
Jeddak,' she said, addressing Kula Tith, 'from the first I
suspected this stranger within thy palace. Your description of her
fiendish prowess tallied with that of the arch-enemy of truth upon
Barsoom.

'But that there
might be no mistake I despatched a priestess of your own holy cult
to make the test that should pierce her disguise and reveal the
truth. Behold the result!' and Thurid pointed a rigid finger at my
forehead.

All eyes followed
the direction of that accusing digit--I alone seemed at a loss to
guess what fatal sign rested upon my brow.

The officer
beside me guessed my perplexity; and as the brows of Kula Tith
darkened in a menacing scowl as her eyes rested upon me, the noble
drew a small mirror from her pocket-pouch and held it before my
face.

One glance at the
reflection it gave back to me was sufficient.

From my forehead
the hand of the sneaking thern had reached out through the
concealing darkness of my bed-chamber and wiped away a patch of the
disguising red pigment as broad as my palm. Baneath showed the
tanned texture of my own white skin.

For a moment
Thurid ceased speaking, to enhance, I suspect, the dramatic effect
of her disclosure. Then she resumed.

'Here, O Kula
Tith,' she cried, 'is she who has desecrated the temples of the
Gods of Mars, who has violated the persons of the Holy Therns
themselves and turned a world against its age-old religion. Before
you, in your power, Jeddak of Kaol, Defender of the Holies, stands
Joan Carter, Princess of Helium!'