by Lin Carter
And there had been one other factor as well. For Barim Redbeard was no native of the Dakshina, the Southlands, but one of Thongor’s own countrymen. The red-drbearded warrior had been born and bred in the wintry wastelands of the barren North—in Belnarth on the shores of Zharanga Tethrabaal the Great North Ocean. Belnarth lay not far from Thongor’s own savage homeland of Valkarth beyond Eobar. And, although Thongor was the last of his people, the Black Hawk clan, Redbeard’s own tribe, the White Wolf people of Belnarth, were their ancient friends, clan-brothers bound by old ties of blood-kinship. Northlandermen were rarely found below the Mountains of Mommur, and they tended to stand together when the arrow was broken and red war roared.
Charn Thovis was also grinning, happy to be aboard ship again with his old comrades—and proud that Thongor the Mighty had chosen him out of ten thousand warriors to fight at his side. As they exchanged good-mornings, fat, friendly Blay thrust his red, perspiring moonface up the steps of the quarterdeck and hailed them.
“Ha, Cap’n—Lords! Cook says to come below, the mornin’ meal be ready, and ’twill fast grow cold an you come not to table in all haste,” he wheezed.
They adjourned to the great cabin where Barim Red-beard slept. It was huge and untidy, a long, low-roofed chamber, with great wooden beams from which horn lanterns dangled, and diamond-paned windows that opened out on the rudder and the white wake. Barim had offered the great cabin to his regal guest, but Thongor—or Khongrim as he had named himself for the duration of this adventure—refused to drive Barim from his own quarters, preferring to share a cabin with Thangmar, the blond Kodanga. As for Charn Thovis, he was pleased to share quarters with the Rmoahal, Roegir, for the two of them had become fast friends during their first voyage together.
A large folding table had been set up in the great cabin, and Thongor, Charn Thovis, Redbeard and his first mate, a peevish, black-avised little officer named Angar Zend, sat them down to a huge breakfast. Broiled fish in lemon sauce, fresh fruit and hot buttered bread, cold carved fowl and spiced boars-flesh, great slabs of tangy cheese, and ripe brown ale in cups of gold thieved from the belly of a rich merchant galley out of Shembis—all this and more was set upon the table. The fresh salt air had given them all a hearty appetite, and they fell to like true trenchermen.
ALL that day and night, and the next day as well, the lean black galley with the dragon-beaked prow of burnished brass and the great scarlet sails rode the winds ever south.
The great Gulf of Patanga cleft the Lemurian continent almost to its heart. There were many leagues of blue water to sail before the tall towers of Tarakus would rise on the horizon.
Gulls squawked and circled about their masts. White water foamed in their wake. The lean sharp prow of the galley, as knife-like as its very namesake, clove through the shining water like a slashing blade.
The walls of Patanga fell away astern and were lost in the distance. Hour after hour they cut through the briny waves. Another city of the Gulf, Thurdis, where Barand Thon ruled as Prince, hove into view along the western shores of the Gulf and fell away behind them. At the rail, Thongor and Charn Thovis watched as Shembis and Zangabal and finally Pelorm hove into view.
The great Gulf widened now as they neared its mouth, where the waters of the Gulf mingled with the wild waves of Yashengzeb Chun the Southern Sea. Only a few more leagues, now, ere they would come into view of Tarakus the Pirate City. Another night’s sailing, and a few hours of daylight, and the Scimitar would drop anchor in the great harbor below the capitol of the corsair kingdom.
Then it was that Fate took a hand.
IT was a scrawny Turanian sailor, his bare brown back wealed with scars from the slave-galleys of Shembis, who saw the monster first. High atop the foremast was he stationed, for aloft in the upper rigging his keen eyes could see far through the gathering dusk. His bellow of alarm rang down from the masthead, and in a trice bare and booted feet thudded on the deck as all hands were summoned to battle stations.
Water broke a few hundred yards to port as a great scaled head lit with cold eyes of lambent flame rose above the surface of the Gulf.
Fat Blay sucked in his breath. Sour old Durgan squinted with his one good eye and muttered a prayer to the Sea God, Shastadion. Thangmar grimly tested the edge of his great sword and tall Roegir strung his terrible war bow. All about them, the battle-hardened pirate crew of the Scimitar prepared to fight for their lives against the Terror of the Deep.
For, in truth, it was one of the dread sea dragons of Lemuria. A mighty larth, cold eyes gleaming, floated on the waves to port, scaly dragon jaws open, revealing the glitter of its terrible fangs.
Seldom did the sea dragons of Yashengzeb Chun come this far up the Gulf, for the deeps of the high seas were their domain. But at certain seasons of the year the fish whereon they fed deserted the depths of the southern ocean and came up the Gulf to breed in the mouths of the rivers. Then the ravages of hunger drove the mighty reptilian monsters from their accustomed deeps … and then the sailors of old Lemuria had cause to pray to their green-bearded God of the Seas. For a full-grown larth is twice ship-size, and its lashing tail and titanic claws and terrible fanged jaws can tear a wooden galley asunder, or drag it beneath the waves.
Thongor stood on the quarterdeck, the great Valkarthan broadsword in his hand. Once, twelve years before, a tremendous storm had blown his airboat off course, into the waters of the lower Gulf—and he had been attacked by one of the mighty sea dragons of the deep. In that perilous hour, the Nineteen Gods had watched over his fortunes, and he and his comrades had escaped alive from the jaws of the Terror of the Deep. But if the dragon attacked the Scimitar, could he hope to escape a second time from the fangs of the savage and ferocious larth?
“Gorchak—Turan—Minga—man the catapults! Roegir, you great rogue, up into the rigging with you and your archers—fire arrows! All hands prepare to defend ship!”
Barim Redbeard, swearing lustily and dragging on battle-dress, roared orders to his pirates. Great traps were opened in the decks amidships. Pulleys creaked and groaned as sea catapults were hauled up into position. Heavy slugs of jagged stone or cast iron, which, in time of peace, served the Scimitar for ballast, were lifted into the arms of the powerful catapults. Capstans and windlasses groaned as the lines were drawn tight, and keen-eyed seamen measured height and windage and distance.
In these remote ages, long before the discovery of gunpowder or the invention of cannon, the Lemurian seamen had no other defense against the dragons of the sea save for these powerful catapults. A well-placed stone could, with luck, brain or maim or cripple even a full-grown larth. And many times, even though its scaly hide went unscathed by the deadly missiles, defensive action of this sort could frighten a dragon back into the waves.
But all knew that if the catapults failed, they were lost. For if once the dragon came at the galley itself, sword or spear or war arrow would have little effect upon that terrible reptilian engine of destruction. The mighty claws of the dragon could tear the decks apart, topple masts, stave in the hull.
For a time the larth paused, arched neck and jagged spine and blunt, serpent’s head riding above the waves. It seemed to examine the ship, raking it with cold reptilian eyes that flamed like pits of yellow flame.
Then it gave voice to a harsh cry, and headed for the Scimitar. Almost in the same instant a sword came flashing down, cutting the taut line, and one of the catapults crashed skywards. The heavy missile went whirling through the twilight—and missed. A fountain of white foam gushed up to one side of the moving monster.
Twangg! Twunngg! The tight-bent arms of two more catapults flickered high, hurling their jagged and deadly burdens at the oncoming dragon. One grazed the gliding muscles of its shoulder, rousing a hiss of pain and rage. The other missed widely—
And the larth was upon them!
One great scaled paw closed on the rail. Timbers squealed and crunched as claws as huge as scimitars sunk deep in the hard wood. Like something out
of a nightmare, the arched neck writhed into the twilight sky and the terrible head hung above the decks, eyes blazing like feral lamps through the dusk.
The dragon struck—once—twice! The head soared up again, a wriggling body clamped in the mighty jaws. The dragon crunched down, blood spurted in a grisly rain on the deck planks, the long snaky throat gulped down pulped flesh, and the head flashed out again, following a golden-skinned Cadornyan as he fled shrieking.
In a trice the jaws closed over another struggling body, and again blood squirted from the fanged jaws of the sea monster.
Arrows flickered from the rigging, but they could do little against the scaly hide of the dragon. Roegir plied his great bow tirelessly, and sent shaft after shaft whistling at the swinging head. But the barbed and deadly hail flickered, glancing from the tough mail of the monster.
Then the great head swung suddenly toward the place where Thongor stood, ready for action, broadsword glittering in one powerful fist.
It all happened so swiftly that it was done in no time. In the uncertain light, in the swift blur of movement, in the confusion of running, yelling, battling men, none could say exactly what had happened. Nor did Thongor have time to think, to plan, to reason. In a flashing instant, blind instinct drove him into whirlwind action.
The mighty Valkarthan leaped aside as the great head swung his way. To the rail in one great bound, then he sprang up and seized the rigging and hauled himself aloft. And—as the broad wedge-shaped head of the sea dragon swung by beneath him—he dropped down atop the dragon’s head!
Before anyone could quite grasp the rapid sequence of events, the giant Barbarian sat astride the dragon’s neck, powerful legs clamped together at its throat, just under the hinge of the lower jaw.
Bright steel flashed ruddy in the sunset flame as the great Valkarthan broadsword swung up—and came slashing down! Fetid reptilian gore oozed down the scaly jaws and the larth was convulsed with the stabbing pain of Thongor’s mighty blow.
With the instincts of a born huntsman, Thongor struck again and again at one of the most vulnerable portions of the dragon’s anatomy—the base of its skull, where the neck was narrow, the tough hide thin, and the spine exposed. If he could sever the dragon’s spinal cord, the crippled monster could not wreck the pirate galley.
Again and again the great broadsword rose and fell, slashing ever deeper into the base of the spine.
Giving voice to a deafening bellow of pain and outrage, the mighty reptile released the Scimitar’s rail and swung away, sprawling in a smothering welter of flying foam.
Almost before Charn Thovis or Barim Redbeard could realize what had taken place, the writhing dragon was a hundred yards astern, slithering amidst shattering spray. The tiny figure of Thongor still clinging fast to its neck— the Valkarthan broadsword still chopping at the spine— the monster voiced one last shrill screech of fury—and sank from view, floundering beneath the roiling, white-foamed waters of the Gulf.
The dragon’s tail rose once to smash the waves, then slithered through the wash of bubbling foam and was gone.
Gone, too, from the sight and the knowledge of men, was Thongor.
Silence fell like a pall over the blood-smeared and splinter-strewn decks of the pirate galley. The corsairs stared at one another in horror. Cold eyes softened; swarthy faces paled; hoarse voices muttered the names of their Gods.
Long they searched the seas about—long after daylight waned in a welter of crimson and darkness crept over the face of the deep. The longboats of the Scimitar combed the black waters, keen eyes searching each wave for some token of the bold Valkarthan. By lantern-glow and torchlight, they searched on, far into the night.
But when the great golden moon rose above the far edges of the earth to flood the Gulf with pale glory, Barim Redbeard called off the hunt. His face grim and impassive, his frosty eyes cold with dread, the great Redbeard knew in his heart of hearts ’twould do no good to search on into the darkness of the night.
The waves had swallowed the Warrior of the West, and only the Gods knew whither his indomitable spirit had flown … whether to the cold Shadowlands of the spirit world or the drowned black caverns of the unknown deep.
BOOK TWO
THE STORM BREAKS
“There be limitations set upon the inquiries of men, beyond which the Gods in their wisdom have forbidden man to seek knowledge. Nor have the High Gods set arbitrary borders to man’s lawful curiosity … for vast forces beyond human comprehension move between the edges of Chaos and the shores of Creation, forces whereof the Gods themselves know but little and which neither God nor Demon dares to tamper with…”
—The Scarlet Edda
CHAPTER 5:
RED WOLF OF TARAKUS
And whether the Prince be alive or dead,
Could none in Tsargol say—
For none knew whether his soul was fled,
Nor where his body lay.
—The Tsargol Records
FOR days and nights beyond counting, Karm Karvus had lain in the foul dungeons beneath the towering bulk of the Pirate City, and he hungered for freedom. Freedom and—revenge!
When the squadron of corsair ships had struck suddenly from the darkness of the deep, his great trireme had had but little time to fight back. Like black wolves of the sea, the long slim hulls had closed in for the kill. The warriors aboard the great princely trireme drew naked steel and prepared to defend their Lord to the very gates of death itself … alas, the sea wolves of Tarakus had denied them even that privilege.
His lean jaw set grimly, his clear gray eyes bleak, the Prince of Tsargol remembered the terrible scene vividly. On the foredeck of the lead vessel a strange and outlandish contraption stood bolted to the planking. A fantastic thing it was, all globes of crystal and rods of twinkling brass. But from it struck a weird and terrible beam of gray light… colorless light that twisted the sight awry and held under some hypnotic fascination the minds of all they who had looked upon it.
With a terrific surge of iron will, the gallant Prince had torn his eyes from the shimmering hypnotic lamp. But his men, lords and nobles, courtiers and servants, officers and seamen, stood alike—staring at the source of gray throbbing luminance like men struck suddenly to stone by the unlidding of a Gorgon’s eye.
The red wolves of Tarakus had swarmed aboard unopposed. Karm Karvus had fought mightily, but sheer weight of numbers had overwhelmed him and brought him down at last And still his brave and loyal warriors stood as if rooted to the deck … staring at the glowing gray lamp of madness … motionless as stones, until the grinning, sardonic leader of the pirates, whom Karm Karvus now knew to be Red Kashtar himself, had spat out one ringing command:
“Kill!”
Then, as the grinning corsairs quitted the decks of the Crown of Tsargol, bearing away the Prince as their bound and helpless captive, the decks erupted into a gory battle. His soul twisting with revulsion, Karm Karvus had watched with horror as his men were transformed by that word into foaming, snarling beasts. Like mad dogs, the Tsargolians turned to rend one another with tooth and claw and naked strength, while the red corsairs of Tarakus laughed and made mock of them in their howling madness …
That had been many days ago. With a grim effort, Karm Karvus turned his memory from that nightmarish scene out of some scarlet pit of hell. Father of Gods and Men—must I remember?
The dungeon cell wherein they had hurled him was dark and clammy and foul with the stench of human droppings and the vile odor of rotten straw wherewith the bare, beslimed stone flags of the floor were strewn. From somewhere in the stone ceiling above, moisture dripped ceaselessly. The slow plink-plunk of it went on forever without change, and the monotony thereof drew his nerves taut and quivering.
His lips twisted in a wry smile. Little need had these sea wolves of Tarakus, to drive men mad with lamps of magic force: the dismal monotony of their foul and reeking dungeon cells were maddening enough.
The long hours of the day he passed in medita
tion. Betimes, to relieve the thick silence that was broken only by the ceaseless and maddening sound of dripping water, the captive Prince recited aloud in ringing tones such passages from the epics and sagas of his warlike people as he had aforetime committed to memory. And much thought he gave to the baffling problem of why he had been taken. At length he had come to the conclusion that the Red Brotherhood was grown ambitious and had dared to seek a mighty ransom from his city through threats to his captive person. His clear eyes went cold and bleak at the thought. His people loved him well, and well he knew how heavily they would pay to keep him safe from the burning needles and the tearing hooks of the torturers of Tarakus … and in his heart of hearts, Karm Karvus silently vowed that, if ever he escaped these black and loathsome pits and attained to freedom once again, he would not rest until he had burned this nest of robbers to the ground and hanged that sly and smirking rogue, their chieftain, from the gibbet.
Another possibility had occurred to him as well, and one by far the more daring and ambitious of the two. And that was that Kashtar the Red Wolf was grown avaricious beyond all conceivable cost of ransom of his person—and sought his very throne. Could it be that the corsair horde dared to seek to add scarlet-walled Tsargol to their pirate empire? It was not beyond the bounds of possibility. Karm Karvus prayed his nobles would be strong enough to seek to guard the greater good and keep their city free, even if it meant that by so doing they damned him to a slow and humiliating death under the knives of the torturers …
Thus he passed the slow, weary hours of his captivity, and waited for the opportunity to escape, if ever such should come. Nor did he ever guess the full magnitude of Kashtar’s gigantic plot against the Six Cities …