John Carter

by Stuart Moore

  Carter had to admit: he didn’t either.

  “You cannot enter here,” Sola protested. “It is forbidden!” But Dejah Thoris paid her no heed. The Helium woman ran into the ruined temple, waving a torch to illuminate toppled pillars and walls made of jumbled stone.

  Carter and Sola followed her into a huge, echoing chamber. An ancient statue of a goddess loomed above them, several stories high.

  “You insisted I unleash her,” Sola said. Carter nodded, grimacing.

  Dejah lifted her torch, lighting up a window made of dusty, rose-colored glass. In its intricate stone mullions shone a nine-legged pattern identical to the one on the medallion.

  “Look familiar?” she asked.

  Sola knelt. She raised two hands to cover her head, two to her heart.

  “Sure,” Dejah sneered, “kneel before the Holy Thern.” She turned angrily to Carter. “You can cloak yourself in religion to fool savage Tharks, but not me. I see what you’re doing.”

  Carter shrugged, baffled.

  “You waste my time with fantasies of ‘Earth’ while my city lies on the verge of defeat.”

  “You called me a—a Thern.” Carter pointed to the statue. “Is that what she is?”

  “She is Issus!” Sola cried. “Her temple stands at the heart of every city on Barsoom. All worship the Goddess.”

  “Not quite all,” Dejah said.

  But Carter had stopped listening. He was staring up at a bas-relief, intertwined with an unknown, ancient script, running around the base of the temple ceiling. A geometric pattern wove in and out of it.

  He’d seen that pattern before. In the cave, in Arizona. Back home.

  “What does that say?”

  “Forgotten your own scripture? How convenient.”

  Carter grabbed Dejah and sprang upward, enjoying her yelp of surprise. He landed on a tottering pillar just below the bas-relief.

  Dejah struggled in his grip, almost dropping her torch. “Put me down!”

  “As soon as you read this to me.”

  Grimacing, she handed him the torch. He held it up to the wall, and she pointed at the first in a row of images: human or near-human figures wearing medallions, standing above a vast mountain range.

  “‘In the time of oceans, all Barsoom was lawlessness and chaos.’” She paused, struggling to read. “‘There came…the Therns. Holy messengers of the Goddess Issus…they took the firstborn and divided the red men from the green. To each they gave the gifts of knowledge…’” Her finger passed over a series of blurred, overlapping images of godlike Therns.

  “The doubled faces,” Carter said. “What do they mean?”

  “Supposedly the Therns once walked among us as guardians. Taking any form they wished…speaking directly to men, in their minds. Guiding them, protecting…”

  “Like angels.”

  Once again he grabbed up Dejah, then leaped to a ledge on the opposite side of the temple. Dejah glared at him and turned back to the wall. She ran her finger along an image of a long, snaking river.

  “‘The Therns’ final gift of knowledge,’” she read, “‘was the Way of the Goddess—’”

  Carter stabbed out a finger to touch the far end of the river’s image. Another medallion was depicted there within an upside-down pyramid. “There’s the medallion again. What does it mean?”

  “Don’t rush me. ‘… that those who seek the solace of eternity may journey down the River…to pass through the sacred Gates of Iss and find everlasting peace in the bosom of Issus.’”

  Carter followed her gaze to a carving of huge, ornate gates. “‘The Gates of Iss…’ Do you think the answer is there?”

  She hesitated. “Yes. I’m certain of it.” Then she cast a glance down at Sola, on the ground, and lowered her voice. “What if I could take you there?”

  He frowned. “What if I don’t trust you?”

  “Then we’d be even.”

  He smiled.

  “I can lead you to the Gates,” Dejah continued. “To the answers you seek. A way back to Jasoom.”

  “Earth.”

  “Earth.” She looked around conspiratorially. “Assuming you can get us out of here.”

  They locked eyes for a long moment. Then he stuck out his hand. “Deal.”

  She stared at the hand, puzzled.

  “You shake it,” he said.

  A very awkward handshake ensued. Carter smiled again, despite himself. “Now I just need to get that medallion off of Tars. I don’t suppose he’ll just—”

  “Dotar Sojat?”

  They looked down to see Sola struggling in the grip of Sarkoja’s four strong arms. Five Tharks raised rifles in warning, aiming them straight at Carter and Dejah.

  “I told you it was forbidden,” Sola said.

  TARS TARKAS burst into the holding tent, sweeping the flap open with all four arms. “What in the name of Issus is going on?”

  Four Tharks held Carter, who struggled in tight bindings. Sarkoja stood above the kneeling Sola and Dejah Thoris, brandishing a sword in triumph.

  “Issus has been profaned,” Sarkoja said. “We found these ones plotting in the temple.”

  Tars stared down at Dejah Thoris. “In the temple?”

  “Sola led them there.”

  Carter watched as Tars’s gaze turned to Sola, and a horrible, pained look crossed the Jeddak’s face.

  “No,” Carter said. “Sola tried to stop us. I meant no disrespect to your goddess, Tars.”

  Sarkoja pressed her blade against Carter’s neck. “Your ‘right arm’ was planning to rob you of the medallion, my Jeddak. He planned to take it down the River Iss to use it for greater blasphemy.”

  “I’m just tryin’ to get home!” Carter cried.

  Tal Hajus came up behind Tars Tarkas, surveying the scene coldly. “They must all die,” he said. “In the arena.”

  Tars reached forward with one arm and shoved Sarkoja aside. He hoisted Carter up in the air with two more arms and carried the Earthman away from the others, to a corner of the tent.

  “How could you do this?” Tars’s fourth hand clamped down hard on Carter’s throat and began to strangle him. “I spared your life, made you Dotar Sojat. Yet her life means nothing to you!”

  The Thark’s voice was bitter, disgusted…and tinged with an odd, hopeless sadness.

  “You knew,” Tars continued. “You knew she had no room for another mark. Now Sola will die because of you.”

  “She’s—” Carter gasped for breath. “She’s your daughter, isn’t she?”

  The Jeddak’s face lit up with shock and guilt. He hefted Carter again, moved him even farther away from the others, and slammed him up against a rock. Still bound, Carter was helpless to resist.

  “Who told you that?” Tars kept his voice low. “A Thark has no parent but the horde.”

  “Call it a father’s intuition.” Carter glanced down at the bands on his own, bound hand. “But how do you know? That she’s your daughter, I mean?”

  “Her mother kept her egg. Sola is the last flicker of our ancient greatness.”

  Carter pointed to Tars’s medallion. “Then you can’t just stand by and let her be killed—”

  Suddenly Tars grabbed Carter up by the throat again. When the Thark whirled around, Carter saw why: Tal Hajus and Sarkoja had crept up behind them, straining to hear the hushed exchange.

  Tars Tarkas faced Sarkoja directly. “You are correct. My right arms have offended me. It falls to me to cut them off.”

  Then he leaned forward and spoke with all the force of a Thark Jeddak. “Leave us.”

  Tal and Sarkoja filed out, casting suspicious glances back.

  When they were gone, Tars Tarkas pulled out his knife. As he raised it, Carter had a horrible moment of fear and doubt. Had he overplayed his hand? Would the Jeddak really kill Carter to keep secret the truth about Sola?

  Then Tars cut his bonds. Carter was free.

  Sola and Dejah moved in to join them. “You must hurry,” Tars said, p
ointing to the tent’s rear flap.

  Dejah took Carter’s arm. “Thank you, Jeddak—”

  “One condition.” Tars unhooked the medallion, handing it to Carter. “Take Sola with you down the River Iss.”

  Sola gasped. When Tars turned to her, his voice was oddly…human.

  “I’d rather you died in the arms of the Goddess than become food for wild banths in a Thark arena.” Tars turned solemnly to Carter. “From this moment, Sola serves under Dotar Sojat. Where you go, she goes.”

  Carter nodded, then gestured toward the tent’s front flap. “What about Sarkoja and Tal Hajus? What will they do to you?”

  “Leave a Thark his head and his hand, and he may yet conquer.” Tars grinned then, the ghastly Thark smile. “Now go!”

  As Carter started running, followed by Dejah and Sola, he realized in surprise: I’m almost getting used to that grin.

  The three figures galloped across the sands, each astride a swift thoat. Carter heard a noise and turned swiftly, expecting pursuers. But a familiar figure whooped along after them, kicking up a cloud of dust.

  “Woola!” Carter exclaimed. “How in the world—”

  “You belong to him,” Sola said. “Woola would find you anywhere on Barsoom.”

  Dejah Thoris pointed ahead. “Follow me!”

  They rode for many miles, past trackless wastes dotted with a startling variety of ruins. Once, Dejah explained, this had been a lush sea covered with islands, settlements, and ports. But the waters had dried up long ago, and the moving, predatory city of Zodanga had soaked up most of the planet’s remaining resources. Barsoom had become a shadow of a world, a barren desert fallen largely into savagery.

  Carter was captivated by Dejah’s beauty, her energy, and her passion to save her people. But more and more he came to realize she wasn’t telling him everything.

  On the second day, as Dejah rode ahead under the hot sun, Sola frowned up at the sky. Then she pulled her thoat over alongside Carter’s.

  “Dotar Sojat,” she said. “I mean, Carter. I do not think she leads us to the Iss.”

  Carter nodded grimly. “Play along.”

  Then he galloped up fast behind Dejah. As she turned in surprise, he reached out and grabbed the reins of her thoat. “What did you think I’d do when I saw your city?”

  “What?”

  “You’re supposed to be taking us to the river.”

  Sola trotted up alongside and pointed to the twin moons in the sky. “Cluros and Thuria. They should be at our backs by now. You lead us toward Helium.”

  Dejah grimaced and moved to slow her thoat—but Carter tugged on its reins, urging it forward. “Once we reached Helium,” she said, “I knew you would see the virtue of our cause.”

  “Everyone thinks their cause is virtuous, Professor.”

  With a swift motion, he yanked at her saddlebag. Its contents spilled out onto the sand. When Dejah turned in surprise, Carter shoved her roughly off the beast and released its reins.

  Dejah tumbled to the ground. The thoat dashed off, riderless, disappearing quickly over a rise. Carter and Sola broke to the side, riding off together in the opposite direction.

  “No,” Dejah cried. “John Carter, you can’t!”

  “I like this plan better,” Sola said.

  Carter motioned the Thark to silence.

  “You mad fool!” Dejah ran after them on foot, gasping for breath. “You’re not from Earth—and there are no Therns! I only told you what you wanted to hear so you’d help us—so you’d help me.”

  Sola looked over at Carter questioningly.

  “Wait for the truth,” he said, too softly for Dejah to hear.

  “Stop,” Dejah called. “I can’t—I cannot marry him!”

  Carter reined in his thoat and wheeled it around to face Dejah.

  “Can’t marry who?” he asked.

  She glared up at him. “Sab Than. The Zodangan Jeddak you fought aboard the airship. He offered a truce in exchange for my hand. My father fears the Zodangans’ new weaponry, so he consented, but I—I could not.”

  “Your father?”

  “Tardos Mors.”

  “The Jeddak of Helium?” Sola rode up, her voice sharp with shock. “She is a princess!”

  “A princess of Mars.” Carter pulled up alongside Dejah, began to circle around her. “A princess who didn’t want to get married, so she ran away.”

  He suddenly felt angry. She’d used him, lied to him, placed hundreds of lives in peril. And for this?

  He turned and trotted away.

  Dejah kept after him. “I didn’t run. I escaped.”

  He swung his thoat around. “Why don’t you just marry him and help your people?”

  “I can’t do that to them.”

  “Do what? Let them live?”

  “A life of oppression? That is not living.”

  “Death is not living.”

  “But they don’t have to die.”

  “Right. You can marry Sab Than.”

  “Or you can help us—uhhh!”

  He heard Dejah trip and turned to see her sprawled face down on the sand. Swearing, he pulled his thoat to a halt, then jumped down to help her.

  He reached out a hand, but she slapped it away.

  Sola circled on her own thoat, keeping her distance.

  Slowly Dejah stood up and stared at the ground. When she spoke, there was steel in her voice.

  “If you had the means to save others—to save those you cared most about—would you not take any action to do that?”

  “No good will come of me fighting your war.”

  “I would lay down my life for Helium. But I will not sell my soul.” She looked down again. “Yes, I ran away. I was afraid, weak. Maybe I should have just married him. But I feared it would mean the end of Barsoom.”

  She took both his shoulders in her firm, lovely hands.

  “I tell you true, John Carter of Earth. There are no Gates of Iss. They are not real.”

  “I’m sorry, Princess.” He held up the medallion, almost apologetically. “But this is real, and it brought me here. If it can bring me home again…I’ve got to try.”

  They looked into each other’s eyes for a long moment. A strange thought came to Carter: if she can understand my sorrow, then maybe I can understand hers.

  Together, hand in hand, they walked back to his thoat.

  THE CITY of Zodanga was on the move. Stalking along on countless gigantic legs, shaking the desert beneath a thousand tons of iron and stone. Crushing all that lay before it, leaving a deep trench in its wake.

  Sab Than strode across the open-air expanse of the Royal Hangar. To the airmen preparing his personal flier he looked fearless, almost as powerful as the Therns themselves. But Matai Shang’s consciousness still buzzed within Sab’s mind, constantly reminding him who held the true power here.

  A general approached, nervous. “Sire. Prudence demands you take an escort with you.”

  “No,” Matai Shang said in Sab’s mind. His tone of voice brooked no argument.

  “I will go alone,” Sab said aloud.

  “But Jeddak—”

  “In one stroke, I can end a thousand years of civil war and bring Helium to her knees forever. But my general, in his superior wisdom, objects?”

  The general withdrew, mumbling apologies.

  As Sab Than mounted the flier, he whispered to Matai Shang. “I’m even starting to talk like you.”

  The Thern made no reply.

  The flier rose up into the sky, leaving the spires of Zodanga behind. “I have doubts about this plan,” Sab said. “The princess is still missing. And that white ape…”

  “Don’t concern yourself with them.”

  Then a switch seemed to open in Sab Than’s brain, and suddenly he saw what Matai Shang saw. A dozen images at once: the city of Zodanga on its scuttling legs. Sab Than’s own flier, seen from the ground as it climbed into the sky. Tardos Mors, his eyes dark as he prepared for a royal wedding. A long view
of the blue-spired city of Helium, twin halves divided by a deep, unbridgeable chasm.

  And then, just for a moment, an image of the open desert: Dejah Thoris, a Thark female, and the white ape called Carter winding their way down a deep trench toward the River Iss.

  They’re everywhere, Sab realized, the Therns. And whatever one of them sees, all the others see too, through their brothers’ eyes.

  Matai Shang broke the connection. Sab blinked, startled and disoriented. The flier lurched beneath him, and he struggled to right it.

  “They will not reach the Gates,” Matai said. “Wherever they are, I am already there.”

  By the time they reached the River Iss, the thoats were parched. Carter led his mount down to the black water and left it to drink. He stood taking in the scene as Sola and Dejah Thoris rode up behind him and dismounted. Faithful Woola had found them again too and galloped up to join them at river’s edge.

  Carter had expected to see signs of life around the river—bodies of water were very rare on Barsoom. But the shore held no people, red or green. Only canoes, some wrecked and some whole, all littered with abandoned food and offerings. A fatal stillness hung over the landscape.

  Sola gestured at the offerings. “Here, pilgrims must leave behind all they have, all they know. Never to return.” She lowered her head, spoke more softly. “May the Goddess find me worthy.”

  Carter glanced briefly at her. Sola had been very quiet for the past day. Carter wished, not for the first time, that he understood the Tharks better.

  He knelt down, scooped up a handful of water—and pitched over as Woola slammed into him, whimpering and licking his face.

  “Woola!”

  Then Dejah gasped. Carter looked up, followed her gaze, and saw his thoat lying dead on the riverbank a few feet away. Foam oozed out of its muzzle.

  “The water is poisonous.” Thoroughly, Carter shook the water off his hands and wiped them clean. He turned to Woola, who sat panting next to him. “Good boy!”

  Then he spied Sola, beginning a solemn march down to the river.

  “Wait!”

  Carter leaped up and landed on the riverbank between Sola and the water. She reached out to push him aside, but he stood firm. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “It is my way, Dotar Sojat. Not yours.” Her voice was flat. “I must honor my Jeddak, and redeem my unworthiness.”