Tanar of Pellucidar p-3

by Edgar Rice Burroughs

And now the attention of all was focused on the actors in the tragedy below. Men had bound the wrists of the prisoner together behind his back and placed a blindfold across his eyes.

  "Watch below, son of a king," said The Cid to Tanar, "and you will know what it means to walk the plank."

  "I am watching," said Tanar, "and I see that it takes many of your people to make one of mine do this thing, whatever it may be."

  The girl laughed, but The Cid scowled more deeply, while Bohar cast a venomous glance at Tanar.

  Now men with drawn knives and sharp pikes lined the plank on either side of the ship's rail and others lifted the prisoner to the inboard end so that he faced the opposite end of the plank that protruded far out over the sea, where great monsters of the deep cut the waves with giant backs as they paralleled the ship's course—giant saurians, long extinct upon the outer crust.

  Prodding the defenseless man with knife and pike they goaded him forward along the narrow plank to the accompaniment of loud oaths and vulgar jests and hoarse laughter.

  Erect and proud, the Thurian marched fearlessly to his doom. He made no complaint and when he reached the outer end of the plank and his foot found no new place beyond he made no outcry. Just for an instant he drew back his foot and hesitated and then, silently, he leaped far out, and, turning, dove head foremost into the sea.

  Tanar turned his eyes away and it chanced that he turned them in the direction of the girl. To his surprise he saw that she, too, had refused to look at the last moment and in her face, turned toward his, he saw an expression of suffering.

  Could it be that this woman of The Cid's brutal race felt sympathy and sorrow for a suffering enemy?

  Tanar doubted it. More likely that something she had eaten that day had disagreed with her.

  "Now," cried The Cid, "you have seen a man walk the plank and know what I may do with you, if I choose."

  Tanar shrugged. "I hope I may be as indifferent to my fate as was my comrade," he said, "for you certainly got little enough sport out of him."

  "If I turn you over to Bohar we shall have sport," replied The Cid. "He has other means of enlivening a dull day that far surpass the tame exercise on the plank."

  The girl turned angrily upon The Cid. "You shall not do that!" she cried. "You promised me that you would not torture any prisoners while I was with the fleet."

  "If he behaves I shall not," said The Cid, "but if he does not I shall turn him over to Bohar the Bloody. Do not forget that I am Chief of Korsar and that even you may be punished if you interfere."

  Again the girl laughed. "You can frighten the others, Chief of Korsar," she said, "but not me."

  "If she were mine," muttered Bohar threateningly, but the girl interrupted him.

  "I am not, nor ever shall be," she said.

  "Do not be too sure of that," growled The Cid. "I can give you to whom I please; let the matter drop." He turned to the Sarian prisoner. "What is your name, son of a king?" he asked.

  "Tanar."

  "Listen well, Tanar," said The Cid impressively. "Our prisoners do not live beyond the time that they be of service to us. Some of you will be kept to exhibit to the people of Korsar, after which they will be of little use to me, but you can purchase life and, perhaps, freedom."

  "How?" demanded Tanar.

  "Your people were armed with weapons far better than ours," explained The Cid; "your powder was more powerful and more dependable. Half the time ours fails to ignite at the first attempt."

  "That must be embarrassing," remarked Tanar.

  "It is fatal," said The Cid.

  "But what has it to do with me?" asked the prisoner.

  "If you will teach us how to make better weapons and such powder as your people have you shall be spared and shall have your freedom."

  Tanar made no reply—he was thinking—thinking of the supremacy that their superior weapons gave his people—thinking of the fate that lay in store for him and for those poor devils in the dark, foul hole below deck.

  "Well?" demanded The Cid.

  "Will you spare the others, too?" he asked.

  "Why should I?"

  "I shall need their help," said Tanar. "I do not know all that is necessary to make the weapons and the powder." As a matter of fact he knew nothing about the manufacture of either, but he saw here a chance to save his fellow prisoners, or at least to delay their destruction and gain time in which they might find means to escape, nor did he hesitate to deceive The Cid, for is not all fair in war?

  "Very well," said the Korsar chief; "if you and they give me no trouble you shall all live—provided you teach us how to make weapons and powder like your own."

  "We cannot live in the filthy hole in which we are penned," retorted the Sarian; "neither can we live without food. Soon we shall all sicken and die. We are people of the open air—we cannot be smothered in dark holes filled with vermin and be starved, and live."

  "You shall not be returned to the hole," said The Cid. "There is no danger that you will escape."

  "And the others?" demanded Tanar.

  "They remain where they are!"

  "They will all die, and without them I cannot make powder," Tanar reminded him.

  The Cid scowled. "You would have my ship overrun with enemies," he growled.

  "They are unarmed."

  "Then they certainly would be killed," said The Cid. "No one would survive long among that pack an' he were not armed," he waved a hand contemptuously toward the half-naked throng below.

  "Then leave the hatches off and give them decent air and more and better food."

  "I'll do it," said The Cid. "Bohar, have the forward hatches removed, place a guard there with orders to kill any prisoner who attempts to come on deck and any of our men who attempts to go below; see, too, that the prisoners get the same rations as our own men."

  It was with a feeling of relief that amounted almost to happiness that Tanar saw Bohar depart to carry out the orders of The Cid, for he knew well that his people could not long survive the hideous and unaccustomed confinement and the vile food that had been his lot and theirs since they had been brought aboard the Korsar ship. Presently The Cid went to his cabin and Tanar, left to his own devices, walked to the stern and leaning on the rail gazed into the hazy upcurving distance where lay the land of the Sarians, his land, beyond the haze.

  Far astern a small boat rose and fell with the great, long billows. Fierce denizens of the deep constantly threatened it, storms menaced it, but on it forged in the wake of the great fleet—a frail and tiny thing made strong and powerful by the wills of three men.

  But this Tanar did not see, for the mist hid it. He would have been heartened to know that his Emperor was risking his life to save him.

  As he gazed and dreamed he became conscious of a presence near him, but he did not turn, for who was there upon that ship who might have access to this upper deck, whom he might care to see or speak with?

  Presently he heard a voice at his elbow, a low, golden voice that brought him around facing its owner. It was the girl.

  "You are looking back toward your own country?" she said.

  "Yes."

  "You will never see it again," she said, a note of sadness in her voice, as though she understood his feelings and sympathized.

  "Perhaps not, but why should you care? I am an enemy."

  "I do not know why I should care," replied the girl. "What is your name?"

  "Tanar."

  "Is that all?"

  "I am called Tanar the Fleet One."

  "Why?"

  "Because in all Sari none can outdistance me."

  "Sari—is that the name of your country?"

  "Yes."

  "What is it like?"

  "It is a high plateau among the mountains. It is a very lovely country, with leaping rivers and great trees. It is filled with game. We hunt the great ryth there and the tarag for meat and for sport and there are countless lesser animals that give us food and clothing."

  "Have you
no enemies? You are not a warlike people as are the Korsars."

  "We defeated the warlike Korsars," he reminded her.

  "I would not speak of that too often," she said. "The tempers of the Korsars are short and they love to kill."

  "Why do you not kill me then?" he demanded. "You have a knife and a pistol in your sash, like the others."

  The girl only smiled.

  "Perhaps you are not a Korsar," he exclaimed. "You were captured as I was and are a prisoner."

  "I am no prisoner," she replied.

  "But you are not a Korsar," he insisted.

  "Ask The Cid—he will doubtless cutlass you for your impertinence; but why do you think I am not a Korsar?"

  "You are too beautiful and too fine," he replied. "You have shown sympathy and that is a finer sentiment far beyond their mental capability. They are—"

  "Be careful, enemy; perhaps I am a Korsar!"

  "I do not believe it," said Tanar.

  "Then keep your beliefs to yourself, prisoner," retorted the girl in a haughty tone.

  "What is this?" demanded a rough voice behind Tanar. "What has this thing said to you, Stellara?"

  Tanar wheeled to face Bohar the Bloody.

  "I questioned that she was of the same race as you," snapped Tanar before the girl could reply. "It is inconceivable that one so beautiful could be tainted by the blood of Korsar."

  His face flaming with rage, Bohar laid a hand upon one of his knives and stepped truculently toward the Sarian. "It is death to insult the daughter of The Cid," he cried, whipping the knife from his sash and striking a wicked blow at Tanar.

  The Sarian, light of foot, trained from childhood in the defensive as well as offensive use of edged weapons, stepped quickly to one side and then as quickly in again and once more Bohar the Bloody sprawled upon the deck to a well-delivered blow.

  Bohar was fairly foaming at the mouth with rage as he jerked his heavy pistol from his gaudy sash and aiming it at Tanar's chest from where he lay upon the deck, pulled the trigger. At the same instant the girl sprang forward as though to prevent the slaying of the prisoner.

  It all happened so quickly that Tanar scarcely knew the sequence of events, but what he did know was that the powder failed to ignite, and then he laughed.

  "You had better wait until I have taught you how to make powder that will burn before you try to murder me, Bohar," he said.

  The Bloody One scrambled to his feet and Tanar stood ready to receive the expected charge, but the girl stepped between them with an imperious gesture.

  "Enough of this!" she cried. "It is The Cid's wish that this man live. Would you like to have The Cid know that you tried to pistol him, Bohar?"

  The Bloody One stood glaring at Tanar for several seconds, then he wheeled and strode away without a word. "It would seem that Bohar does not like me," said Tanar, smiling.

  "He dislikes nearly every one," said Stellara, "but he hates you—now."

  "Because I knocked him down, I suppose. I cannot blame him."

  "That is not the real reason," said the girl.

  "What is, then?"

  She hesitated and then she laughed. "He is jealous. Bohar wants me for his mate."

  "But why should he be jealous of me?"

  Stellara looked Tanar up and down and then she laughed again. "I do not know," she said. "You are not much of a man beside our huge Korsars—with your beardless face and your small waist. It would take two of you to make one of them."

  To Tanar her tone implied thinly veiled contempt and it piqued him, but why it should he did not know and that annoyed him, too. What was she but the savage daughter of a savage, boorish Korsar?

  When he had first learned from Bohar's lips that she was the daughter and not the mate of The Cid he had felt an unaccountable relief, half unconsciously and without at all attempting to analyze his reaction.

  Perhaps it was the girl's beauty that had made such a relationship with The Cid seem repulsive, perhaps it was her lesser ruthlessness, which seemed superlative gentleness by contrast with the brutality of Bohar and The Cid, but now she seemed capable of a refined cruelty, which was, after all, what he might have expected to find in one form or another in the daughter of the Chief of the Korsars.

  As one will, when piqued, and just at random, Tanar loosed a bolt in the hope that it might annoy her. "Bohar knows you better than I," he said; "perhaps he knew that he had cause for jealousy."

  "Perhaps," she replied, enigmatically, "but no one will ever know, for Bohar will kill you—I know himwell enough to know that."

  II DISASTER

  UPON the timeless seas of Pellucidar a voyage may last for an hour or a year—that depends not upon its duration, but upon the important occurrences which mark its course.

  Curving upward along the inside of the arc of a great circle the Korsar fleet ploughed the restless sea. Favorable winds carried the ships onward. The noonday sun hung perpetually at zenith. Men ate when they were hungry, slept when they were tired, or slept against the time when sleep might be denied them, for the people of Pellucidar seem endowed with a faculty that permits them to store sleep, as it were, in times of ease, against the time when sleep might be denied them, against the more strenuous periods of hunting and warfare when there is no opportunity for sleep. Similarly, they eat with unbelievable irregularity.

  Tanar had slept and eaten several times since his encounter with Bohar, whom he had seen upon various occasions since without an actual meeting. The Bloody One seemed to be biding his time.

  Stellara had kept to her cabin with the old woman, who Tanar surmised was her mother. He wondered if Stellara would look like the mother or The Cid when she was older, and he shuddered when he considered either eventuality.

  As he stood thus musing, Tanar's attention was attracted by the actions of the men on the lower deck. He saw them looking across the port bow and upward and, following the direction of their eyes with his, he saw the rare phenomenon of a cloud in the brilliant sky.

  Some one must have notified The Cid at about the same time, for he came from his cabin and looked long and searchingly at the heavens.

  In his loud voice The Cid bellowed commands and his wild crew scrambled to their stations like monkeys, swarming aloft or standing by on deck ready to do his bidding. Down came the great sails and reefed were the lesser ones, and throughout the fleet, scattered over the surface of the shining sea, the example of the Commander was followed.

  The cloud was increasing in size and coming rapidly nearer. No longer was it the small white cloud that had first attracted their attention, but a great, bulging, ominous, black mass that frowned down upon the ocean, turning it a sullen gray where the shadow lay.

  The wind that had been blowing gently ceased suddenly. The ship fell off and rolled in the trough of the sea. The silence that followed cast a spell of terror over the ship's company.

  Tanar, watching, saw the change. If these rough seafaring men blenched before the threat of the great cloud the danger must be great indeed.

  The Sarians were mountain people. Tanar knew little of the sea, but if Tanar feared anything on Pellucidar it was the sea. The sight, therefore, of these savage Korsar sailors cringing in terror was far from reassuring.

  Someone had come to the rail and was standing at his side.

  "When that has passed," said a voice, "there will be fewer ships in the fleet of Korsar and fewer men to go home to their women."

  He turned and saw Stellara looking upward at the cloud.

  "You do not seem afraid," he said.

  "Nor you," replied the girl. "We seem the only people aboard who are not afraid."

  "Look down at the prisoners," he told her. "They show no fear."

  "Why?" she asked.

  "They are Pellucidarians," he replied, proudly.

  "We are all of Pellucidar," she reminded him.

  "I refer to The Empire," he said.

  "Why are you not afraid?" she asked. "Are you so much braver than the Korsars?
" There was no sarcasm in her tone.

  "I am very much afraid," replied Tanar. "Mine are mountain people—we know little of the sea or its ways."

  "But you show no fear," insisted Stellara.

  "That is the result of heredity and training," he replied.

  "The Korsars show their fear," she mused. She spoke as one who was of different blood. "They boast much of their bravery," she continued as though speaking to herself, "but when the sky frowns they show fear." There seemed a little note of contempt in her voice. "See!" she cried. "It is coming!"

  The cloud was tearing toward them now and beneath it the sea was lashed to fury. Shreds of cloud whirled and twisted at the edges of the great cloud mass. Shreds of spume whirled and twisted above the angry waves. And then the storm struck the ship, laying it over on its side.

  What ensued was appalling to a mountaineer, unaccustomed to the sea—the chaos of watery mountains, tumbling, rolling, lashing at the wallowing ship; the shrieking wind; the driving, blinding spume; the terror-stricken crew, cowed, no longer swaggering bullies.

  Reeling, staggering, clutching at the rail, Bohar the Bloody passed Tanar where he clung with one arm about a stanchion and the other holding Stellara, who would have been hurled to the deck but for the quick action of the Sarian.

  The face of Bohar was an ashen mask against which the red gash of his ugly scar stood out in startling contrast. He looked at Tanar and Stellara, but he passed them by, mumbling to himself.

  Beyond them was The Cid, screaming orders that no one could hear. Toward him Bohar made his way. Above the storm Tanar heard The Bloody One screaming at his chief.

  "Save me! Save me!" he cried. "The boats—lower the boats! The ship is lost."

  It was apparent, even to a landsman, that no small boat could live in such a sea even if one could have been lowered. The Cid paid no attention to his lieutenant, but clung where he was, bawling commands.

  A mighty sea rose suddenly above the bow; it hung there for an instant and then rolled in upon the lower deck—tons of crushing, pitiless, insensate sea—rolled in upon the huddled, screaming seamen. Naught but the high prow and the lofty poop showed above the angry waves—just for an instant the great ship strained and shuddered, battling for life.