The thought of the wolf came pregnant with hate and menace. "We knew many of Hatha's clan were captured, but did not know the Humanites dared enslave you thus, brothers!"
A bay stallion, ears flattened and eyes rolling, reared up despite the saw-edged bit that cut his mouth.
"Tark, have you come to free us? By the Cavern, speak but a word and we fight and die here now!"
"My warriors can kill you all swiftly — and then Barin dies!" Shan Kar warned the wolf.
"Wait, brothers!" the wolf's thought ordered the rearing, excited horses. "Wait and go quietly with us now — it is for the good of the Brotherhood."
Unearthly, that thought-colloquy of wolf and horses, to Eric Nelson! He was surely deluding himself, he thought — his mind could not actually be hearing that swift interchange of passionate thought—
But the rearing horses quieted, and from them came quick answer. "We obey, Tark! If it is for the Brotherhood!"
Shan Kar spoke to Nelson and the Cockney. "Mount now — and fear nothing. These Hoofed Ones have learned their masters!"
It gave Nelson a creepy feeling to swing into the rude saddle of the golden mare and to realize that his mount was intelligently aware of him, hating him, wanting to kill him.
They rode out of the court and on out through the dark silent windings of forest that enlaced Anshan. Tark ran silently, a black shadow, beside Shan Kar's steed.
Then they were out on the rolling plain, under a sky of magnificent stars against whose sparkling splendor the lofty peaks around L'Lan towered solemn and distant!
"Now lead the way, Tark, and remember that if you lead us wrongly Barin dies!"
The great wolf noiselessly slid ahead of their little mounted party. He trotted almost due north across the plain.
"Keep close behind me," his thought came back. "Obey instantly when I direct you."
Wind, cold from the distant peaks, buffeted Eric Nelson's face as the mare loped steadily. Lefty Wister bucketed along just behind, Diril bringing up the rear with the two spare horses.
The wolf veered constantly to keep always as near as possible to the clumps of trees that dotted the plain. Soon Nelson learned the reason.
Tark whirled, just ahead of them, and his eyes flashed green light as his sharp thought came back to them. "Into the trees! Quickly!"
There was a clump of birch close ahead. They spurred into the little grove. There Shan Kar turned in his saddle toward the wolf, his thought suspicious and menacing.
"Is this a trick? If it is, Tark—"
"Quiet!" commanded the wolf. "Scouts are coming."
They came as three gliding shadows up against the stars. Nelson saw they were eagles winging high in the darkness, soundless as flying clouds, sweeping on toward Anshan.
"Now we can go on," the wolf told them a minute later. "The Winged Ones have passed."
"What are they doing here?" Shan Kar asked harshly. "Going to watch Anshan," was the curt answer of Tark.
They rode on, veering to keep near the infrequent tree-clumps, until the solid wall of the forest loomed up before them.
The forest was like a dark maw gaping for them. The thought of the intelligent, hostile beasts that roamed its ways made it seem a black witch-wood to Nelson. He didn't want to go into it.
Neither did Lefty Wister. The Cockney's voice snarled in the dimness beside Nelson. "If that blasted wolf has got others waiting for us in there—"
It seemed pitch-dark beneath the trees at first. Then Nelson's eyes became more accustomed to the deeper obscurity. He looked up and saw tall trunks and graceful boughs against the stars, recognized the outlines of larch and cedar and fir.
The forest smelled dry. The rainless months had parched it so that each twig the horses stepped on snapped and broke. Tark was a darker shadow in the darkness, leading the way between the trees by occasional back-glances of luminous green eyes.
"Why don't we follow the river to Vruun?" Shan Kar demanded. "It would be the clearest way."
"To discovery," Tark's thought retorted harshly. "Quorr's clan are the greatest danger. The Clawed Ones roam those river-brakes by night."
Clawed Ones? He meant the tigers, Nelson realized. His skin crawled at the thought of meeting those striped killers here.
"No more thoughts-speech unless I speak first!" Tark continued peremptorily. "Your danger deepens with each mile we traverse now."
The horses were jumpy as they went on through the forest, up ridges, through brushy valleys. The mare quivered under Nelson.
Excitement? He wondered They must know they were going toward Vruun. Was that why they were so jumpy? It made Nelson feel a sudden pity for them. These were not the dumb beasts of the outer world. These horses were intelligent as men. And to be captured, enslaved, broken from their complete freedom into beasts of burden—
He thrust such thoughts impatiently from his mind. He was letting the influences of this fantastic valley affect him. Animals were animals, no matter if they could speak telepathically and think—
They had been traveling for more than an hour when a yapping wolf-call from west of them was answered by a low coughing roar from the direction of the river. Tark stopped and came back to them. The wolf's eyes glared up at them.
"We must leave the Hoofed Ones here. We can't trust them not to betray us if we pass others of the Clans."
Instantly from the horses came thoughts of passionate protest. "Tark, we thought you took us to Vruun! Are you not going to free us?"
"Brothers, I cannot!" was the wolf's answer. "For the good of the Brotherhood you must remain captive a while longer."
A moment of silence followed and then Eric Nelson heard the slow thought of their reply. "We trust you, Tark. We will obey."
Nelson dismounted. Shan Kar was speaking swiftly to young Diril.
"You'll wait here with the Hoofed Ones. Slit their throats if they try to send a single thought out."
"They will not!" the wolf flared. "Now follow me and move as silently as you can."
They were at the crest of a wooded ridge. The wolf led northward along this crest, pausing often to sniff the wind. Again, they heard wolf-cries from the west but there was no answer this time. Suddenly Tark whirled, his thought urgent.
"One of the Clawed Ones comes this way! Lie still and I will try to turn him back before he winds you!"
Nelson followed Shan Kar's example and crouched in high ferns. He pulled Lefty down after him as the bewildered Cockney drew his gun. Tark bounded ahead. Nelson glimpsed him stopping in a little patch of starlight between two dead trees ahead.
Tark uttered a low, barking call, looking toward the east. Instantly a coughing grunt answered. A minute later, a big striped beast glided into the patch of starlight — a tiger whose size dwarfed Tark. Nelson's mind clearly caught the swift interchange of thought between the two nearby beasts.
"Tark! Tark of the Hairy Ones, free in the forests! All the Clans have thought you dead or prisoner in Anshan!"
"I escaped, Grih! But Barin is still prisoner in Anshan."
"Not for long, Hairy One! The Guardian gathers the Clans! Word has flown through all the valley that war with the Humanites begins!"
The wolf's thoughts raced. "Grih, you can help me! Hasten you to the forest-edge above Anshan and watch if the Humanites trail me!"
Fiercely throbbed the striped beast's answer. "I go at once! If they come I shall send word by Ei's folk! Speed you to Vruun, brother!"
Nelson saw the tiger whirl and melt away in the dark forest, heading southeastward down the wooded slope. He lowered the gun he'd kept leveled as Tark came loping back to them. "There can be no delay now! We must hurry!"
"So Kree gathers the Clans for war?" Shan Kar said fiercely. "So be it! They shall learn their masters when they come against men!"
The wolf made no answer but his eyes flared brilliantly as he turned to lead on.
Nelson, aware of the vital necessity of keeping the way back to the horses clearly in mind, estimated
they went nearly a mile more along the forested ridge before Tark stopped. The wolf led them down the slope from the ridge a little. Here was a fire-scarred break in the trees that gave vision downward.
"Vruun!" exclaimed Shan Kar in a taut whisper.
Nelson, startled, perceived in his first glimpse that, in the level forest down below this ridge, there sprawled the big river. And beside the river, on their side of it, glimmered the lights and buildings of the city of the Brotherhood.
"Blimy!" choked Lefty Wister. "Look at that place!"
Nelson realized that he was looking upon a city whose strangeness had no counterpart on Earth.
Chapter VIII
WEIRD CITY
Immeasurably ancient and alien looked Vruun, its glassy bubble-domes and towers brooding beneath the stars. Torchlight spilled from open doors and windows to illuminate vaguely its streets and enlacing forest-ways.
For Vruun, like Anshan, was a city into which the forest came. It was like a Venice, with winding ways of woods instead of canals — woods that were woven into the very texture of the city.
Eric Nelson, crouching with Shan Kar and the Cockney and the great wolf above the city, felt a cold shock of incredulity as he glimpsed the figures that came and went past lighted doorways down there. For those figures were not all human.
He had anticipated that. But anticipation had not tempered the shock of actually seeing it.
"It's a devil's city!" husked Lefty Wister. The little Cockney was shivering. "Look at those animals!"
"Now you understand why we Humanites rebelled and seceded from Vruun!" came Shan Kar's throbbing whisper.
Men and beasts came and went together across those torchlit doorways below. Men and women in silk or warrior dress. And beasts of the Brotherhood, mingling with the humans, jostling them.
Nelson glimpsed a little pack of gray wolves trotting into the city from the south. He saw two great tigers moving out of it that way. And across a shallow ford a half-dozen wild-maned horses came splashing over the river to Vruun.
Men and beasts of the Brotherhood-meeting and mingling in fantastic fraternity in this ancient, alien city! Wings swept across the sky and he saw great eagles gliding down toward the openings high in the glassy towers. He realized then that those towers had been built as eyries for the Winged Ones, that all Vruun, like Anshan, had been built to house this incredible fraternal mingling of species!
"There are too many abroad in Vruun — too many for this late!" Shan Kar was muttering.
"The coming of war has stirred all the Qans," came Tark's answering thought.
The wolf continued quickly. "Jhanon, the prisoner you seek to free, is held in the Hall of the Clans. But the Guardian and the Clan-leaders undoubtedly hold council there tonight."
Nelson glimpsed the distant building at which the wolf was gazing, an enormous pale bubble-structure, shimmering vaguely in the starlight near the center of the forest city.
"You've got to get us into the hall, so that we may liberate Jhanon," Shan Kar quickly told the wolf.
Nelson realized that everything was working their way. The fact of the Humanite prisoner being in that building made it possible to let Tark lead them right in there before they turned on him. Yet he had a dim suspicion that this fortunate coincidence was too fortunate! If Tark had really fathomed that their mission was to seize Kree and Nsharra—
The wolf's clear thought interrupted his uneasy speculations. "There's only one secret way to the Hall and that's by the drains of the ancients."
"We could too easily lose ourselves in that maze of tunnels," objected Shan Kar.
"Not if I guide you," Tark assured. "But the decision is yours. You can see there is no other way for you to enter Vruun."
Nelson liked the prospect less and less. But it was obviously madness for them to try entering the city openly. Unless they took the wolf's way in they must give up the whole attempt.
He said as much to Shan Kar. "We'll try it. Lefty, you can wait here if you want to."
"I'm goin'," whispered the Cockney hoarsely.
"We will swing around to enter Vruun from the north side," Tark said, "Few of the Brotherhood ever go out that way from the city."
"Why not?" Nelson demanded suspiciously.
Shan Kar answered, pointing. "The Cavern of Creation, the forbidden place, lies up there."
Nelson stared with swift interest. He saw that, north of Vruun, the level forests that encompassed the city marched up to grassy hills that were the foothills of the great northern mountains. In the face of those dark hills he glimpsed a great cavernous opening. He could see it in the dark because light came from it-a vague, unreal, quivering white glow.
The light danced and wavered, throbbing like a heart. Witch-light, ghost-light, pulsing mysteriously from that great opening!
"Yes, that is the Cavern," Shan Kar answered his thought. "The glow is of the cold fire that forbids entrance to all except the few who know the secret way."
Cold fire? Nelson felt a sharp wonder. There must be something deadly there to have inspired such awe and fear. But what?
Shan Kar said savagely, "The Cavern is a curse to L'Lan! That unholy place started the Brotherhood's lying myth that our human and beast races were there created equal."
They lost sight of that mysterious distant eye of light as they followed Tark down the forest slope. The wolf led them into the gully of a small stream-bed that ran past the north side of Vruun toward the river.
The stream-bed was empty in this dry season, its sands baked flat and hard. Its high banks hid the city from them as they approached. The wolf finally stopped and they heard his urgent thought-command. "This way — and quickly!"
They blundered after him toward a dark, mouth-like opening in the southern bank of the little gully. Tark led into the opening and Shan Kar, sword in hand, followed. Nelson and the Cockney gripped their pistols as they too stooped and went in.
They found themselves in absolute darkness. Nelson flashed his pocket-light, startling both Tark and Shan Kar.
"What is this place?" Nelson demanded.
It was a round tunnel of glassy substance. They could not have kept footing in it but for the dried sand and silt on its floor.
"These drains carry the waters from the ridges in the rainy season down beneath the city to the river," explained Shan Kar. "No man knows all their labyrinth."
"No man, but we of the Clans know," put in Tark. "I can lead you to an opening directly beneath the Hall."
Shan Kar surreptitiously pressed Nelson's wrist. It was the signal they had agreed upon and he knew what it meant. They were to stun the wolf as soon as he led them beneath the Hall of Clans. Then, swiftly and secretly, they must seize Kree and Nsharra and return.
Nsharra? Nelson felt an odd quickening of his pulse each time he thought of the witch-girl who had nearly had his life once. He hated that irrational throb of excitement.
"Still romantic," he told himself satirically. "Even ten years of Asia hasn't ground all that out of you."
Shan Kar was telling Tark, "Lead the way. But, Tark, remember that if you try to go too fast you will die very quickly."
The wolf made no reply but trotted deliberately forward up the gently slanting tunnel. The three men, stooping, followed. Soon, the tunnel forked. Tark unhesitatingly took the left turn. They followed, their pistols and the light covering him.
The tense silent progress into these ramifying tube-ways beneath Vruun began to get on Eric Nelson's nerves. He began to think he could hear a whispering echo of sound from behind them.
He told himself as he glanced swiftly backward, that he was letting his nerve slip, that he-
He did glimpse something back there in the tunnel! Blazing eyes in the gloom, eyes that were following them!
"It's a trap! We're being followed-" Nelson started to yell.
But the wolf caught his thought and acted even as the sound left his lips. Tark whirled and charged back on them with inconceivable swiftness. Hi
s hairy body was a living battering-ram that knocked the little light from Nelson's hand. The wolf crashed on through them.
"Knew it!" shrilled Lefty Wister, and triggered his automatic half-blindly as the light smashed out against the floor.
The thunderous echoes of the forty-five were deafening in the confined tunnel and Nelson heard ricochets screaming. Then Tark, who had crashed back through them to join those other eyes following them, sent his thought through the dark to them.
"We block your way to liberty! You cannot escape — lay down your weapons!"
"A trick!" raged Shan Kar. "Tark somehow managed to betray us without our knowing."
"As you planned to betray me with your lie of coming for Jhanon!" rang the wolf's thought from the darkness. "Fools, not to know that when Grih went toward Anshan at my order, he'd strike our trail and backtrail it — follow us to Vruun!"
Nelson, in a flash, realized the wolf's cunning in sending that Clawed One they had met in the forest on a direction that would cross their trail and thus tell the tiger something was wrong.
"Lay down your weapons and we shall not kill!" Tark's thought continued swiftly. "You shall be our hostages for Barin!"
For answer, Lefty Wister mouthed a curse and emptied his gun into the darkness. But again the slugs ricocheted in whining shrieks off the curved walls of the tunnel.
"They're back around the fork where your weapons can't reach them!" Shan Kar cried. "They'll arouse all Vruun! No chance now to seize the Guardian. We must escape this trap!"
Nelson, scrambling back to the fork in the tunnel, had hastily pulled a bulbous object from his pocket. He ripped out its pin.
"This will clear the way out for us!" he rasped and leaned and hurled the deadly thing around the fork of the tunnel.
"Down!" he yelled, and at the same instant heard the swift warning thought of Tark.
"An outland weapon, Grih! Out of the tunnel, quick!"
Nelson had a second to remember that Tark had seen grenades in action in Yen Shi before his own grenade exploded.
The explosion in the confined tunnel felt titanic. A giant scorching hand smashed them down flatter against the silted floor. Nelson leaped up, still dazed and shaky from the explosion, and shouted to the others. "Now — back out of here!"
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