Zanthodon

by Lin Carter

  On the far side of the promontory, the coast stretched away in a long curve. An immense grassy plain met our eyes, larger in its extent than the plain of the trantors on the other side of the Peaks of Peril. Far off beyond the plain, on the misty horizon, we saw dim islands in the sea of Sogar-Jad, and a line of mountains marching down the world. A green mass at the foot of those mountains could only be another sector of jungle country.

  "My chieftain, we can make better time by traversing these plains in a straight line than by following the coast of the sea," suggested Jorn diffidently. "See how it curves upon itself."

  I agreed instantly. If we crossed the plain in a straight line, we would reach the farther edge of the sea more swiftly than if we followed the meandering curve of the seacoast.

  After a very brief rest, we proceeded to do so.

  That Xask had survived the attack of the giant spider was due to his own cool nerves. When the shaggy horror had come picking its eight-legged way down the strands of the web, Fumio had turned pale as milk and bolted in pure fear.

  I suppose his cowardly reaction was, after all, only natural. Gone was his respect for his divinity: if God cannot get himself out of a spiderweb, what could a mere mortal like Fumio do?

  Xask had marshaled his strength and calmed his leaping pulse. Since it did no good to kick and struggle (that only enmeshed him the more tightly in the sticky strands), he would be wiser to apply common sense. Xask lifted his legs off the ground and folded them under him. His weight was slight, for he was a man of slender build, but he still weighed a lot more than the timid little uld for whom the web had been spun.

  In a word, the web sagged under the dead weight of the Zarian. The strands stretched; one or two of them snapped. Xask found himself lying on his back upon the sward with only his forearms still caught in the web. Using his feet, he kicked himself backwards until the web stretched even farther. Another strand snapped, then another. Eventually he was free.

  During these unexpected actions, the bloated albino spider had prudently ceased its descent. It hung there cautiously watching the strange actions of its prey. When that prey managed to disentangle itself from the web, the spider waited until the man-thing had vanished out of sight, then began patiently and philosophically to repair the damage done to its web.

  There will always be another uld, it probably thought to itself.

  Xask reached a jungle stream and washed himself, scraping his arms and legs free of the stickiness with handful: of gritty sand scooped from the bottom. Then he continued on through the jungle with extreme caution.

  When he emerged onto the beach, the first thing he saw was Eric Carstairs and his warriors circumambulating the promontory. It was still the desire of the Zarian to capture Eric Carstairs again, so that he could coax or threaten or pry from him the secrets of the thunder-weapon which he still wore at his waist.

  So Xask, keeping well out of sight, simply followed our tracks.

  When he reached the plain beyond the promontory, our tracks abruptly ceased. It did not take Xask very long to figure out that we were traversing the plain in a straight line in order to save time. It puzzled the clever little Zarian, though. What did we think we were doing? Of course, Xask had no way of knowing about the Princess Darya or the Barbary pirates; but even if he had known, our actions would have remained incomprehensible to him.

  For what does a man like Xask know about the love between a man and a woman? All he is capable of feeling is the love of power.

  As there was nothing else for him to do, Xask followed us across the plain.

  We did not get very far. Intent on running and trying to conserve our strength, we were trotting along, not paying enough attention to the things in our immediate vicinity. This is usually a mistake anywhere; it is a real big mistake to make in . For the Underground World has more surprises than you can imagine.

  We ran into a herd of dinosaurs.

  They were very big dinosaurs, with long, curving necks and pebbled bronze-and-copper hides.

  There were a few things very strange about them. The first thing was that they wore bridles, bits and reins. Another thing that was odd was that they were hunting us.

  The third thing was that men were riding on their backs.

  "The Dragonmen of Zar!" cried Varak, eyes bulging. "Barely did the warriors of Sothar elude their clutches as we journeyed hither from our lost land! We are doomed, my chieftain!"

  By this time the men in the saddles had seen us and were coming about.

  "Scatter!" I yelled. "Lose yourselves-hide in the grass!"

  Obediently, my men spread out in different directions and hid themselves, even Murg.

  It didn't do us much good, though. Leaping from the backs of their gigantic mounts, the Dragonmen pursued. The only ones they caught were the Professor and myself. They prodded us to our feet with slender spears crafted of some light, glittering metal. Then they looked us over, talking among themselves in a tongue I did not recognize but the Professor did. His eyes lit up with that spooky excitement that is the fervor of the scholar.

  "By Ventris and Evans!" he breathed, voice quavering.

  "They are speaking the language of ancient Crete, Minoan Crete, by all that's unholy!"

  "Yeah?" I said skeptically, while the little men bound my wrists behind me, and others stood guard with leveled spears. "I knew the writings haft been deciphered, but I didn't know anybody had figgered out what their lingo sounds like-"

  "Well, I have a Theory of my own," he began, eyes glittering. I groaned, having heard that one far too many times before.

  They dragged us up to share the capacious saddles, tugged the heads of their dragonish steeds around and we went riding off across the plains toward the edge of the distant mountains. My men were widely scattered and had not dared to try to rescue us lest we be slain, I knew.

  Suddenly, a small, slim figure that I recognized stepped into our path with lifted arms. The Dragonmen reined their reptiles to a ponderous halt.

  "It is Prince Xask!" one of them cried in amazement. "The exile-the outlaw!"

  "The Empress has placed him under sentence of death if ever he shows his face among us again," said another. "Let us ride him down-"

  "Hold!" cried Xask. "The Sacred Empress will revoke the sentence of death that lies upon my head when she sees the gift I bring to lay at her feet!"

  "What gift may that be, Xask the Liar?" demanded the leader, disbelief visible in his countenance.

  "The key to the throne of all the world!" cried Xask, taking something from his waist and brandishing it.

  And my heart sank within me to the chill of a ghastly premonition.

  For it was my .45 automatic-the thunder-weapon.

  The decision was beyond the authority of the captain of this squad of Dragonmen. Binding Xask as we ourselves were bound, he was mounted behind one of the riders, and we continued off lumbering across the plains. Catching my eye, Xask smiled. It wasn't a smile so much as an oily, gloating smirk. I kept my face stony.

  We rode away.

  But behind us, Hurok the Apeman rose to his feet from the thick grasses where he had concealed himself, and his great hands clenched and unclenched hungrily.

  For the only true friend he had in all of had just been carried off into the unknown realm of mystery and marvel-Zar.

  THE END