CHAPTER VI
THE BATTLE OF THE BRANDS
I
Now for two years had the remnants of the tribe been settled in theValley of Fire. They had prospered exceedingly. The caves wereswarming with strong children; for at the Chief's orders every warriorhad taken to himself either two or three wives, so that none of thewidows had been left unmated. Grom alone remained with but one wife,although his position in the tribe, second only to that of Bawrhimself, would have entitled him to as many as he might choose.
Singularly happy with the girl A-ya, Grom had been unwilling toreceive other women into their little grotto, which branched off fromthe high arched entrance of the main cave. He might, however, haveyielded, from policy and for the sake of the tribe, to pressure fromthe Chief, but for a look of startled anguish which he had seen leapinto A-ya's eyes when he mentioned the matter to her. This hadsurprised him at the moment, but it had also thrilled him curiously.And as the girl made no objection to a step so absolutely inaccordance with the tribal customs, Grom thought about it a good deal.A few days later he excused himself to the Chief, saying that otherwomen in his cave would be a nuisance, and would interfere with thosestudies of the Shining One which had proved so beneficial to thetribe. Bawr had accepted the excuse, though somewhat perplexed by it,and had accommodatingly taken the extra wives himself--a solutionwhich had seemed to meet with the unqualified approval of A-ya.
The first winter in the Valley of Fire had been a wonderful one to thetribe, thanks to the fierce but beneficent element ever shining,dancing and whispering in its mysterious tongue before the cave doors.Bleak winds and driving, icy rains out of the north had no longer anypower to distress them.
But when the storm was violent, with drenching and persistent rain,then it was found necessary to feed the fires before the cave-mouthslavishly with dry fuel from the stores which Grom's forethought hadcaused to be accumulated under shelter. These contests between fireand rain were sagaciously represented by Bawr (who had by now to hisauthority as Chief added the subtle sanctions of High Priest) as thefight of the Shining One in protection of the tribe, his children.
On more than one occasion of torrential downpour the struggle hadalmost seemed to hang for a while in doubt. But the Shining One lostno prestige, thereby, for always, down there across the valley-mouth,kept leaping and dancing those unquenchable flames of scarlet, amberand violet, fed by the volcanic gases from within the crevice, andutterly regardless of whatever floods the sky might loose upon them.This was evidence conclusive that the Shining One was master of thestorm, no less than of the monsters which fled so terror-strickenbefore him.
In the early spring, the girl A-ya bore a child to Grom; a big-limbed,vigorous boy, with shapely head and spacious brow. In this event, andin the mother's happiness about it (a happiness that seemed to therest of the women to savor of foolish extravagance), Grom felt agladness which dignity forbade him to betray.
But pondering over the little one with bent brows, and with deep eyesfull of visions, he conceived such an ambition as had perhaps neverbefore entered into the heart of man. It was that this child mightgrow up to achieve some wonderful thing, as he himself had done, forthe advancement of his people. Of this baby, child of the woman towardwhom he felt emotions so new and so profound, he had a premonitionthat new and incalculable things would come.
One day Grom was following the trail of a deer some distance up thevalley. Skilled hunter that he was, he could read in the trail thathis quarry was not far ahead, and also that it had not yet takenalarm. He followed cautiously, up the wind, noiseless as a leopard,his sagacious eyes taking note of every detail about him.
Presently he came to a spot where the trail was broken. There was atwenty-foot gap to the next hoofprints, and these went off at rightangles to the direction which the quarry had hitherto been pursuing.Grom halted abruptly, slipped behind a tree, crouched, and peeredabout him with the tense vigilance of a startled fox. He knew thatsomething had frightened the deer, and frightened it badly. Itbehooved him to find out what that something was.
For some minutes he stood motionless as the trunk against which heleant, searching every bush and thicket with his keen gaze, andsniffing the air with expert nostrils. There was nothing perceptibleto explain that sudden fright of the deer. He was on the point ofslipping around the trunk to investigate from another angle. But stop!There on a patch of soil where some bear had been grubbing for tubershe detected a strange footprint. Instantly, he sank to the ground, andwormed his way over, silently as a snake, to examine it.
It was a human footprint, but much larger than his own, or those ofhis tribe; and Grom's beard, and the stiff hairs on the nape of hiscorded neck, bristled with hostility at the sight of it.
The toes of this portentous print were immensely long and muscular,the heel protruded grotesquely far behind the arch of the foot, whichwas low and flat. The pressure was very marked along all the outeredge, as if the author of the print had walked on the outer sides ofhis feet. To Grom, who was an adept in the signs of the trail, itneeded no second look to be informed that one of the Bow-legs had beenhere. And the trail was not five minutes old.
Grom slipped under the nearest bushes, and writhed forward withamazing speed in the direction indicated by the strange footprint,pausing every other second to look, sniff the air, and listen. Thetrail was as clear as daylight to him. Suddenly he heard voices,several of them, guttural and squealing, and stopped again as ifturned to stone. Then another voice, at which he started in amazement.It was Mawg's, speaking quietly and confidentially. Mawg, then, hadgone over to the Bow-legs! Grom's forehead wrinkled. A-ya had beenright. He ought to have killed the traitor. He writhed himself into adense covert, and presently, over the broken brink of a vine-drapedledge, was able to command a view of the speakers.
They were five in number, and grouped almost immediately below him.Four were of the Bow-legs, squat, huge in the shoulder, long-armed,flat-skulled, of a yellowish clay color, with protruding jaws, andgaping, pit-like, upturned nostrils to their wide, bridgeless noses.Grom's own nose wrinkled in disgust as the sour taint of them breathedup to him.
They were all armed with spears and stone-headed clubs, such as theirpeople had been unacquainted with up to the time of their attack uponthe Tribe of the Little Hills. It was apparent to Grom that therenegade Mawg, who towered among them arrogantly, had been teachingthem what he knew of effective weapons.
Having no remotest comprehension of the language of the Bow-legs--whichMawg was speaking with them--Grom could get little clue to the drift oftheir talk. They gesticulated frequently toward the east, and thenagain toward the caves at the valley-mouth, so Grom guessed readilyenough that they were planning something against his people.
It was clear, also, that this was but a little scouting party whichthe renegade had led in to spy upon the weakness of the tribe. Thiswas as far as he could premise with any certainty. The obviousconclusion was that these spies would return to their own country, tolead back such an invasion as should blot the Children of the ShiningOne out of existence.
Grom was quick to realize that to listen any longer was to wasteinvaluable time. All that it was possible for him to learn, he hadlearned. Writhing softly back till he had gained what he considered asafe distance from the spies, he rose to his feet and ran, at firstnoiselessly, and crouching as he went, then at the top of that speedfor which he was famous in the tribe. Reaching the Caves, he laid thematter hurriedly before the Chief, and within five minutes they wereleading a dozen warriors up the trail.
Besides their customary weapons, both Grom and the Chief carriedfire-sticks, tubes of thick, green bark, tied round with a raw hide,filled with smouldering punk, and perforated with a number of holestoward the upper end. This was one of Grom's inventions, of provedefficacy against saber-tooth and bear. By cramming a handful of dryfiber and twigs into the mouth of the tube, and then whirling itaround his head, he was able to obtain a sudden and most unexpectedburst of flame which no beast ever
dared to face, and which neverfailed to compel the awe and wonder of his followers.
Like shadows the little band went gliding in single file through thethickets and under the drooping branches, their passage marked only bythe occasional upspringing of a startled bird or the frightenedcrashing flight of some timorous beast surprised by their swift andnoiseless approach. Arriving near the hollow under the ledge, theysank flat and wormed their way forward like weasels till they hadgained the post of observation behind the vine-clad rock.
But the strangers had vanished. An examination of their footprintsshowed that they had fled in haste; and to Grom's chagrin it looked asif he had himself given them the alarm. The problem was solved in afew minutes by the discovery that Mawg--easily detected by his finerfootprints--had scaled the ledge and come upon the place where Gromhad lain hidden to watch them. Seeing that they were discovered, andthat their discoverer had evidently gone to arouse the tribe, they hadrealized that, the Bow-legs being slow runners, their only hope lay ininstant flight. From the direction which they had taken it was evidentthat they were fleeing back to their own country.
The Chief ordered instant pursuit. To this Grom demurred, not onlybecause the fugitives had obtained such a start--as was shown by thestate of the trail--but because he dreaded to leave the Caves so longunguarded. He foresaw the possibility of another band of invaderssurprising the Caves during the absence of this most efficientfighting force. But the Chief overruled him.
For several hours was the pursuit kept up; and from the trail itappeared, not only that Mawg was leading his followers cleverly, butalso that the Bow-legs were making no mean speed. The pursuers werecome by now to near the head of the valley, a region with which theywere little familiar. It was a broken country and well fitted forambuscade, where a lesser force, well posted and driven to bay, mightwell secure a deadly advantage. The tribe was too weak to risk its fewfighting men in any uncertain contest; and the Chief, yielding slowlyto Grom's arguments, was on the point of giving the order to turnback, when a harsh scream of terror from just ahead, beyond a shoulderof rock, brought the line to a halt.
Waving their followers into concealment on either side of the trail,the Chief and Grom stole forward and peered cautiously around theturn.
Straight before them fell away a steep and rugged slope. Midway of thedescent, with his back to a rock, crouched one of the Bow-legs,battling frantically with his club to keep off the attack of a pair ofleopards. The man was kneeling upon one knee, with the other legtrailed awkwardly behind him. It seemed an altogether difficult anddisadvantageous position in which to do battle.
"The fool!" said Bawr. "He doesn't know how to fight a leopard."
"He's hurt. His leg is broken!" said Grom. And straightway, a novelpurpose flashing into his far-seeing brain, he ran leaping down theslope to the rescue, waving his fire-stick to a blaze as he went.
The Chief looked puzzled for a moment, wondering why the deliberateGrom should trouble to do what it was plain the leopards would do forhim most effectually. But he dreaded the chance of an ambuscade.Shouting to the men behind to come on, he waved his own fire-stick toa blaze, and followed Grom.
One of the leopards had already succeeded in closing in upon thewounded Bow-leg; but at the sight of Grom and the Chief leaping downupon them they sprang back snarling and scurried off among thethickets like frightened cats. The Bow-leg lifted wild eyes to learnthe meaning of his deliverance. But when he saw those two tall formsrushing at him with flame and smoke circling about their heads, hegave a groan and fell forward upon his face.
Grom stood over him, staring down upon the misshapen and bleeding formwith thoughtful eyes; while the Chief looked on, striving to fathomhis purpose. The warriors came up, shouting savage delight at havingat last got one of their dreaded enemies into their hands alive. Theywould have fallen upon him at once and torn him to pieces. But Gromwaved them back sternly. They growled with indignation, and one,sufficiently prominent in the tribal counsels to dare Grom'sdispleasure, protested hotly against this favor to so venomous a foe.
"I demand this fellow, Bawr, as my captive!" said Grom.
"It was you who took him," answered the Chief. "He is yours." He wasabout to add, "though I can't see what you want of him"; but it was apart of his policy never to seem in doubt or ignorance about anythingthat another might perhaps know. So, instead, he sternly told hisfollowers to obey the law of the tribe and respect Grom's capture.Then Grom stepped close beside him and said at his ear: "Many thingswhich we need to know will Bawr learn from this fellow presently, asto the dangers which are like to come upon us."
At this the Chief, being ready of wit, comprehended Grom's purpose;and, to the amazement of his followers, he looked down upon thehideous prisoner with a smile of satisfaction.
"Well have I called you the Chief's Right Hand," he answered. "I shallalso have to call you the Chief's Wisdom, for in saving this fellow'slife you have shown more forethought than I."
The captive's wounds having been dressed with astringent herbs, andhis broken leg put into splints in accordance with the rude but notineffective surgery of the time, he was placed on a rough litter ofinterlaced branches and carried back by the reluctant warriors to theCaves.
None of the warriors were advanced enough to have understood thepolicy of their leaders, so no effort was made by either the Chief orGrom to explain it. The Chief, doubly secure in his dominance byreason of Grom's loyal support, cared little whether his followerswere content or not, and he took no heed of their ill-humor so long asthey did not allow it to become articulate.
But when, after an hour's sullen tramping, they suddenly grew merry attheir task, and fell to marching with a child-like cheer under theirrepulsive and groaning burden, he was surprised, and made inquiry asto the reason for this sudden complaisance. It turned out that one ofthe warriors, accounted more discerning than his fellows, hadsuggested that the captive was to be nursed back to health in orderthat he might be made an acceptable sacrifice to the Shining One. Asthis notion seemed to meet with such hearty approval, the wise Chiefdid not think it worth while to cast any doubt upon it. In fact, as hethought, such a solution might very well arrive, in the end, in caseGrom's design should fail to come up to his expectations.
To the presence of the hideous and repulsive stranger in her dwelling,A-ya, as was natural, raised warm objection. But when Grom hadexplained his purpose to her, and the imminence of the peril thatthreatened, she yielded readily enough, the dread of Mawg being yetvivid in her imagination. She lent herself cheerfully to the duty ofcaring for the captive's wounds and of helping Grom to teach him thesimple speech of the tribe.
As for the captive, for some days he was possessed by a moroseanticipation of being brained at any moment--an anticipation, however,which did not seem to interfere with his appetite. He would clutcheagerly all the food offered him, and crouch, huddled over it, withhis face to the rock-wall, while he devoured it with frantic haste andbestial noises. But as he found himself treated with invariablekindness, he began to develop an anxious gratitude and docility. OnA-ya's tall form his little round eyes, shy and fierce at the sametime, came to rest with an adoring awe. The smell of him beingextremely offensive to all this cleanly tribe, and especially to A-yaand Grom, who were more fastidious than their fellows, A-ya had takenadvantage of her office as priestess of the Shining One to establish alittle fire within the precincts of her own dwelling, and by thejudicious use of aromatic barks upon the blaze she was able to scentthe place to her taste. And the Bow-leg, seeing her mastery of themysterious and dreadful scarlet tongues which licked upwards from thehollow on their rocky pedestal, regarded her less as a woman than as agoddess--a being who, for her own unknown reasons, chose to bebeneficent toward him, but who plainly could become destructive if heshould in any way transgress. Toward Grom--who regarded him altogetherimpersonally as a means to an end, a pawn to be played prudently in agame of vast import--his attitude was that of the submitted slave, hisfate lying in the hollow of his
master's hand. Toward the rest of thetribe--who, till their curiosity was sated, kept crowding in to stareand jeer and curse--he displayed the savage fear and hate of a lynx atbay.
But the babe on A-ya's arm seemed to him something peculiarlyprecious. It was not only the son of Grom, his grave and distantmaster, but also of that wonderful, beautiful, enigmatic deity, hismistress, the fashioner and controller of the flames. The adorationwhich soon grew up in his heart for A-ya's beauty, but which his aweof her did not suffer him even to realize to himself, was turned uponthe babe, and speedily took the form of a passionate and dog-likedevotion. A-ya, with her mother instinct, was quick to understandthis, and also to realize the possible value to her child of such adevotion, in some future emergency. Moreover, it softened her hearttoward the hideous captive, so that she busied herself not only tohelp Grom teach him their language, but also to reform his manners andmake him somewhat less unpleasant an associate. His wounds soonhealed, thanks to the vitality of his youthful stock; and the bones ofthe broken leg soon knit themselves securely. But Grom's surgeryhaving been hasty and something less than exact, the leg remained socrooked that its owner could do no more than hobble about with alaborious, dragging gait. It being obvious that he could not run away,there was no guard set upon him.
But it soon became equally obvious that nothing would induce him toremove himself from the neighborhood of A-ya's baby. He was like agigantic watchdog squatting at Grom's doorway, chained to it by linksstronger than any that hands could fashion. And those of the tribe whohad been hoping to do honor to the Shining One, as well as to thespirits of their slain kinsmen back in the barrow on the windy hills,by a great and bloody sacrifice, began to realize with discontent thattheir hopes were like enough to be disappointed.
II
The captive said his name was Ook-ootsk--a clicking guttural whichnone but A-ya was able to master. When he had learned to make himselfunderstood, he proved eager to repay Grom's protection by giving allthe information that he possessed. Simple-minded, but with much of achild's shrewdness, he quickly came to regard himself as of someimportance when both the Chief and Grom would spend hours ininterrogating him. His own people he repudiated with bitterness,because, when he had fallen among the rocks and shattered his leg, hisparty had refused to burden their flight by helping him. It became hispride to identify himself with the interests of his master, and tocall himself the slave of his master's baby.
The information which he was able to give was such as to cause theChief and Grom the most profound disquietude. It appeared that theBow-legs, having gradually recovered from the panic of their appallingdefeat in the Pass of the Little Hills, had made up their minds thatthe disaster must be avenged. But no longer did they hold theiropponents cheap on account of their scanty numbers. They realized thatif they would hope to succeed in their next attack they must organize,and prepare themselves by learning how to employ their forces better.To this end, therefore, when Mawg and his fellow-renegades fell intotheir hands, instead of tearing them to pieces in bestial sport, theyhad spared them, and made much of them, and set themselves diligentlyto learn all that the strangers could teach. And Mawg, seeing here hisopportunity both for vengeance on Grom and for the gratification ofthat mad passion for A-ya which had so long obsessed him, had goneabout the business with shrewd foresight and a convincing zeal.
It was apparent from the accounts which Ook-ootsk was able to givethat the invasion would take place as soon as possible after theirhordes were adequately armed with the new weapons. This, saidOok-ootsk, would be soon after the dry season had set in. In any case,he said, the hordes were bound to wait for the dry season, because theway from their country to the Valley of Fire lay through a region ofswamps which became impassable for any large body of migrants duringthe month of rains.
As the dry season was already close upon them, Bawr and Grom now setthemselves feverishly to the arrangement of their defenses. Countingthe older boys who had grown into sizable youths since the last greatbattle and all the able-bodied women and girls, they could muster nomore than about six score of actual combatants. They knew that defeatwould mean nothing less than instant annihilation for the tribe, andfor the women a foul captivity and a loathsome mating. But they knewalso that a mere successful defense would avail them only for themoment. Unless they could inflict upon the invaders such a defeat aswould amount to a paralyzing catastrophe, they would soon be worn downby mere force of numbers, or starved to death in their caves. It wasnot only for defense, therefore, but for wholesale attack--the attackof six score upon as many thousand--that Bawr planned his strategy andGrom wove unheard-of devices.
Of the two great caves occupied by the tribe one was now abandoned, asnot lending itself easily to defense. To Bawr's battle-trained eyes itrevealed itself as rather a trap than a refuge, because from theheights behind it an enemy could roll down rocks enough to effectivelyblock its mouth. But the cliff in which the other cave was hollowedwas practically inaccessible, and hung beetling far over theentrance.
Into this natural fortress the tribe--with an infinite deal ofgrumbling--was removed. Store of roots and dried flesh was gatheredwithin; and every one was set to the collection of dry and half-dry fuel.The light stuff, with an immense number of short, highly-inflammablefaggots, was piled inside the doorway where no rain could reach it. Andthe heavy wood was stacked outside, to right and left, in such a fashionas to form practical ramparts for the innermost line of defense.
Directly in front of the cave spread a small fan-shaped plateauseveral hundred square yards in area. On the right a narrow path, wideenough for but one wayfarer at a time, descended between perpendicularboulders to the second cave. On the left the plateau was bordered bybroken ground, a jumble of serrated rocks, to be traversed only withdifficulty. In front there was a steep but shallow dip, from which theland sloped gently up the valley, clothed with high bush and deepthickets intersected with innumerable narrow trails.
Directly in front of the cave, and about the center of the plateau,burned always, night and day, the sacred fire, tended in turn by themembers of the little band appointed to this distinguished service bythe Chief. Under the Chief's direction the whole of the plateau wasnow cleared of underbrush and grass, and then along its brink was laida chain of small fires, some ten or twelve feet apart, and all readyfor lighting.
Meanwhile, Grom was busy preparing the device on which, according tohis plan of campaign, the ultimate issue was to hang. For days thetribe was kept on the stretch collecting dry and leafy brushwood fromthe other side of the valley, and bundles of dead grass from the richsavannahs beyond the valley-mouth, on the other side of the dancingflames. All this inflammable stuff Grom distributed lavishly throughthe thickets before the plateau, to a distance of nearly a mile up theslope, till the whole space was in reality one vast bonfire laid readyfor the torch.
While these preparations were being rushed--somewhat to the perplexityof the tribe, who could not fathom the tactics of stuffing thelandscape with rubbish--Bawr was keeping a little band of scouts onguard at the far-off head of the valley. They were chosen from theswift runners of the tribe; and Bawr, who was a far-seeing general,had them relieved twice in twenty-four hours, that they might not growweary and fail in vigilance.
When all was ready came a time of trying suspense. As day after dayrolled by without event, cloudless and hot, the country became as dryas tinder; and the tribe, seeing that nothing unusual happened, beganto doubt or to forget the danger that hung over them. There weremurmurs over the strain of ceaseless watching, murmurs which Bawrsuppressed with small ceremony. But the lame Ook-ootsk, squattingmisshapen in Grom's doorway with A-ya's baby in his ape-like arms grewmore and more anxious. As he conveyed to Grom, the longer the delaythe greater the force which was being gathered for the assault.
Having no inkling of Grom's larger designs, he looked with distrust onthe little heaps of wood that were to be fires along the edge of theplateau, and wished them to be piled much bigger, intimating that hispeople,
though they would be terribly afraid of the Shining One, wouldbe forced on from behind by sheer numbers and would trample the smallfires out. The confidence of the Chief and Grom, and of A-ya as well,in the face of the awful peril which hung over them, filled him withamazement.
Then, at last, one evening just in the dying flush of the sunset, camethe scouts, running breathlessly, and one with a ragged spear-wound inhis shoulder. Their eyes were wide as they told of the countlessmyriads of the Bow-legs who were pouring into the head of the valley,led by Mawg and a gigantic black-faced chief as tall as Bawr himself.
"Are they as many," asked Grom, "as they who came against us in theLittle Hills?"
But the panting men threw up their hands.
"As a swarm of locusts to a flock of starlings," they replied.
To their astonishment the Chief smiled with grim satisfaction at thisappalling news.
"It is well," said he. Mounting a rock by the cave-door, he gazed upthe valley, striving to make out the vanguard of the approachinghordes; while Grom, marshalling the servitors of the fire, stationedthem by the range of piles, ready to set light to them on the givenword.
It was nearly an hour--so swift had been the terror of the scouts--beforea low, terrible sound of crashings and mutterings announced that the hordeswere drawing near. It was now twilight, with the first stars appearing ina pallid violet sky; and up the valley could be discerned an obscurelyrolling confusion among the thickets. Bawr gave orders, rapid and concise;and the combatants lined out in a double rank along the front of theplateau some three or four paces behind the piles of wood.
They were armed with stone-headed clubs, large or small, according topersonal taste, and each carried at least three flint-tipped spears.At the head of the narrow path leading up from the lower cave werestationed half a dozen women, similarly armed. Bawr had chosen thesewomen because each of them had one or more young children in the cavebehind her; and he knew that no adventurous foe would get up that pathalive. But A-ya was not among these six wild mothers, for her placewas at the service of the fires.
The ominous roar and that obscure confusion rolled swiftly nearer, andBawr, with a swing of his huge club, sprang down from his post ofobservation and strode to the front. Grom shouted an order, and lightwas set to all the crescent of fires. They flared up briskly; and atthe same time the big central fire, which had been allowed to sink toa heap of glowing coals, was heaped with dry stuff which sent up aninstant column of flame. The sudden wide illumination, shed somehundreds of yards up the valley, revealed the front ranks of theBow-legs swarming in the brush, their hideous yellow faces, gapingnostrils and pig-like eyes all turned up in awe towards the glare.
The advance of the front ranks came to an instant halt, and the lowmuttering rose to a chorus of harsh cries. Then the tall figure ofMawg sprang to the front, followed, after a moment of wonderinghesitation, by that of the head chief of the hordes, a massivecreature of the true Bow-leg type, but as tall as Bawr himself, and incolor almost black. This giant and Mawg, refusing to be awed by thetremendous phenomenon of the fire, went leaping along the lines oftheir followers, urging them forward, and pointing out that theirenemies stood close beside the flames and took no hurt.
On the front ranks themselves this reasoning seemed, at first, toproduce little effect. But to those just behind it appeared morecogent, seconded as it was by a consuming curiosity. Moreover, themasses in the rear were rolling down, and their pressure presentlybecame irresistible. All at once the front ranks realized that theyhad no choice in the matter. They sagged forward, surged obstinatelyback again, then gave like a bursting dam and poured, yelling andleaping, straight onward toward the crescent of fires.
As soon as the rush was fairly begun, both Mawg and the Black Chiefcleverly extricated themselves from it, running aside to the higher,broken ground at the left of the plateau whence they could see anddirect the attack. It was plain enough that they accounted the frontranks doomed, and were depending on sheer weight of numbers for theinevitable victory.
Standing grim, silent, immovable between their fires, the Chief andGrom awaited the dreadful onset. In all the tribe not a voice wasraised, not a fighter, man or woman, quailed. But many hearts stoodstill, for it looked as if that living flood could never be stayed.Presently from all along its front came a cloud of spears. But theyfell short, not more than half a dozen reaching the edge of theplateau. In instant response came a deep-chested shout from Bawr,followed by a discharge of spears from behind the line of fire.
These spears, driven with free arm and practised skill, went cleanhome in the packed ranks of the foe, but they caused no more than asecond's wavering, as the dead went down and their fellows crowded onstraight over them. A second volley from the grimly silent fighters onthe plateau had somewhat more effect. Driven low, and at shorterrange, every jagged flint-point found its mark, and the screamingvictims hampered those behind. But after a moment the mad flood cameon again, till it was within some thirty paces of the edge of theplateau.
Then came a long shout from Grom, a signal which had been anxiouslyawaited by the front line of his fighters. Each fire had been laid, onthe inner side, with dry faggots of a resinous wood which not onlyblazed freely but held the flame tenaciously. These faggots had beenplaced with only their tips in the fire. Seizing them by theirunlighted ends, the warriors hurled them, blazing, full into thegaping faces before them.
The brutal, gaping faces screeched with pain and terror, and the wholefront rank, beating frantically at the strange missiles, wheeled aboutand clawed at the rank behind, battling to force its way through. Butthe rolling masses were not to be denied. After a brief, terriblestruggle, the would-be fugitives were borne down and troddenunderfoot. The new-comers were greeted with a second discharge of theblazing brands, and the dreadful scene repeated itself. But now therewas a difference. For many of the assailants, realizing that there wasno chance of retreat, came straight on, heedless of brand or spear,with the deadly, uncalculating fury of a beast at bay.
For some seconds, under the specific directions of the Chief on theright center and of Grom far to the left, many of the blazing brandshad been thrown, not into the faces of the front rank, but far overtheir heads, to fall among the tinder-dry brushwood. Long tongues offlame leaped up at once, here, there, everywhere, curling and lickingsavagely. Screeches of horror arose, which brought all the hordes to ahalt as far back as they could be heard. A light wind was blowing upthe valley, and almost at once the scattered flames, gathering volume,came together with a roar. The hordes, smitten with the blindestmadness of panic, turned to flee, springing upon and tearing at eachother in the desperate struggle to escape.
Shouting triumph and derision, the defenders bounded forward, downover the edge of the plateau, and fell upon the huddled ranks beforethem. But these, with all escape cut off, and far outnumbering theirexultant adversaries, now fought like rats in a pit. And the men ofthe caves found themselves locked in a struggle to the death just whenthey had thought the fight was done.
A-ya, no longer needed at the fires, was just about to follow Gromdown into the thick of the reeking battle, when a scream from thecave-mouth made her whip round. She was just in time to see Ook-ootskhurl his spear at the tall figure of Mawg, leaping down upon him fromthe broken slope on the left. A half score of the Bow-legs werefollowing hard upon Mawg's heels. With a scream of warning to Grom sherushed back to the cave. But Grom did not hear her. He had been pulleddown, struck senseless and buried under a writhing heap of foes.
Her long hair streaming behind her, her eyes like those of a tigressprotecting her cubs, A-ya darted to the cave-door. But she did notreach it. Just outside the threshold a club descended upon her head,and she dropped. Instantly she was pounced upon, and bound. A momentlater three Bow-legs, followed by Mawg, streaming with blood, camerunning out of the cave. Mawg swung the limp form across his shoulderwith a grin of satisfaction, and the party beat a hurried retreat upthe slopes.
In a few minutes that last death-
grapple along the front of theplateau came to an end, and Bawr, leaving nearly a third of hisfollowers slain with the slain Bow-legs, led the exultant survivorsback to the cave. It had been a costly victory for the Children ofthe Shining One; but for the invaders it was little less thanannihilation. The flames were raging for a mile up the valley,wherever they were not choked by the piles and windrows of the deador dying Bow-legs. The lurid night was shaken with the incessantrising and falling chorus of shrieks, and far off under the glarerolled that awful receding wave of fugitives, with the flamesleaping upon them and slaying them as they fled. Leaning upon hisclub and gazing thoughtfully across the scene of incredibledestruction, Bawr told himself that never again, so long as thememory of this night survived, would the Bow-legs dare to comeagainst his people.
Then wild lamentation from the women drew the Chief into the cave.Here he found that half the little ones had been killed in that swiftincursion of Mawg, and that nearly all the old men and women had beenslaughtered in defending their charges. Across Grom's doorway,crouching on his face and with his great teeth buried in the throat ofa dead Bow-leg, lay the lame captive, Ook-ootsk. Seeing that he stillbreathed, and marking the fury with which he had fought in defense oftheir little ones, the warriors lifted him aside gently. Beneath him,and safely guarded in the crook of his shaggy arm, they found Grom'sbaby, without a hurt. The women defending the head of the path on theright having seen the rape of A-ya, Bawr handed the babe to one of hisown wives to cherish.
Then search was made for Grom. At first the Chief imagined that he hadfollowed the captors of A-ya, in a desperate hope of effecting herrescue alone. But they found him under a heap of dead, so nearly deadhimself that they despaired of him. Realizing that it was he who hadsaved the tribe, they began over him that great keening lamentationhitherto reserved strictly for the funeral of the supreme Chiefhimself. But Bawr, his massive features furrowed with solicitude,stopped them, vowing that Grom should not die. And lifting the hero inhis arms he bore him into the cave.
Grom's wounds proved to be deep, but not fatal to one of theseclean-blooded sons of the open and the wind. It was some days beforeit was clearly borne in upon him that A-ya had been carried off aliveby the Bow-legs. Then, with a great cry, he sprang to his feet. Theblood spouted afresh from his wounds, and he fell back in a swoon.When he came to himself again, for days he would speak to no one, andit looked as if he would die, not of his wounds so much as of theinsufficient will to live. But a chance word of the captive Ook-ootsk,who was being nursed back to life beside him, reminded him that therewas vengeance to be lived for, and he roused himself a little. ThenBawr, ever subtle in the reading of his people's hearts, suggested tohim that even such a feat as the rescue of the girl A-ya might not beimpossible to the subjugator of the fire and the slayer of a wholepeople.
And from that moment Grom began climbing steadily back to life.
In the Morning of Time Page 6