Assassin of Gor

by Norman, John;

  “Perhaps,” said Ho-Sorl, “any Taurentians that are left over we can give to the girls of the Street of Pots.”

  I turned a blade from my breast, as another four or five Taurentians pressed in upon me.

  “Excellent idea,” said Murmillius.

  “If,” qualified Ho-Sorl, “any are left over.”

  Another dozen Taurentians pressed forward.

  I noted that one Taurentian after another, in a line, approaching, slipped to the sand.

  Ho-Tu, his hook knife dripping, a buckler on his left arm, now stood beside us.

  I parried a blade from his heart.

  “I think you will find,” said Murmillius, “a sword is more useful here than your small knife.”

  Ho-Tu drew his blade and acquitted himself sturdily.

  “Kill them!” I heard Philemon scream.

  More Taurentians, perhaps a hundred, leaped over the wall into the arena and rushed forward.

  We moved through those weary, bloody, reeling bodies about us, to their amazement cutting our way to our new foes.

  I heard Relius cry to Ho-Sorl. “I have slain seventeen!”

  “I lost count long ago,” responded Ho-Sorl.

  Relius laughed with exasperation and added another to his list.

  “It must be some two or three hundred by now,” surmised Ho-Sorl, breathing heavily.

  Fortunately only a few Taurentians could approach us at one time.

  “Boastful sleen!” cried Relius. Then he shouted, “Nineteen!”

  Ho-Sorl dropped a man. “Four hundred and six!” he cried, lunging at another.

  “Silence!” roared Murmillius and, obediently, we fought in silence, save for the crying of men, our breathing, the sparkling ring of blades tempered by wine and fire.

  “There are too many!” I cried.

  Murmillius did not respond. But he fought.

  I turned in an instant’s respite from the attack. I could not see the features of the magnificent fighter who stood beside me.

  “Who are you?” I asked.

  “I am Murmillius,” he laughed.

  “Why does Murmillius fight at the side of Tarl Cabot?” I asked.

  “Let it be said as truly,” said he, “that Tarl Cabot fights at the side of Murmillius.”

  “I do not understand,” I said.

  “Murmillius,” said he, proudly, “is at war.”

  “I, too,” said I, “am at war.” Again Taurentians pressed inward and again we met them. “But,” said I, “my war is not that of Murmillius.”

  “You fight in wars,” said Murmillius, “you know nothing of.”

  “In what war do you fight?” I demanded.

  “In my own,” said Murmillius, meeting an attacker and insolently felling him.

  Then to my surprise I saw, with us, fighting, a common Warrior, not a Taurentian, one whose helmet was not laced with gold nor his shield bound with silver, nor his shoulders covered with the purple of the Ubar’s guard.

  I did not question him, but accepted gratefully his presence at our side.

  More Taurentians, perhaps two hundred more, leaped down from the wall.

  I now saw fights in the audience in the tiers, some between Taurentians and citizens, others between citizens themselves. In some places armed Warriors, of common rank, stood against the purple-clad Taurentians.

  Now those Taurentians left in the stands suddenly failed to restrain the crowds and thousands of citizens were leaping into the arena and others were swarming across the tiers toward the box of the Ubar. I saw Hup bounding and skipping on the tiers, crying out, and saw men throwing off cloaks, revealing blades, and rushing to meet Taurentians.

  I saw Philemon, his face white, his eyes wide, turn and flee through the private passage that gives access to the box of the Ubar. He was followed by some seven or eight Taurentians.

  “The people rise!” cried Ho-Sorl.

  “Now,” laughed Murmillius, looking to me, “I think you will find there are not too many.”

  I saw the Taurentians who had been facing us, perhaps three or four hundred, begin to disperse, fleeing toward the exits leading beneath the stands. The crowds, in their thousands, began to swarm over the walls, dropping to the sand screaming. Among them, shouting orders, were dozens of men, apparently of all castes, each with a scarf of silk of imperial purple wrapped about his left arm.

  Murmillius and I stepped back and, among the bodies, Relius, Ho-Sorl and Ho-Tu, standing to one side, regarded one another.

  He made no move.

  I gave Ho-Tu the key to the helmet I wore, which Phais had thrust in my belt. Ho-Tu removed the helmet.

  The air felt good. The crowd pressed about. I could make nothing of what they were saying.

  “May I not now look upon the face of Murmillius?” asked I.

  “It is not time,” said Murmillius, regarding me.

  “In this war of yours,” said I, “what is the next step?”

  “It is your step,” said he, “Tarl Cabot, Warrior of Ko-ro-ba.”

  I looked at him.

  He pointed to the top of the tiers. There I saw a man with a brown tarn, holding its reins.

  “Surely,” said he, “Gladius of Cos races this afternoon in the Stadium of Tarns?”

  “You know of him?” I stammered.

  “Hurry!” commanded Murmillius. “The Steels must have victory!”

  “What of you?” I asked.

  Murmillius spread his hand over the crowds on the sand and in the tiers.

  “Through the streets,” said he, “we march to the Stadium of Tarns.”

  I raced from the sand to the wall and, seizing a cloak lowered by one who wore the armband of imperial purple, scrambled upward. In an instant I was racing up the long tiers. When I reached the top there stood there a man with a purple scarf of silk, that armband indicating the imperial party. He held the reins of a common saddle tarn. I looked back down the long valley of stone tiers to the sands far below, seeing there in the circle of the arena, seeming small, Murmillius, Ho-Sorl, Relius, Ho-Tu, the milling, stirring crowd. Murmillius lifted his blade to me. It was the salute of a Warrior. A Warrior, I thought to myself, he is of the Warriors. I returned the salute.

  “Hurry!” said the man who held the reins of the tarn.

  I seized the reins of the tarn and leaped to the saddle. I hauled upon the one-strap and took the bird from the heights of the Stadium of Blades, streaking in a moment through the cylinders of Ar, leaving behind me men with whom I had fought, stained sand, and whatever we had together begun there.

  22

  The Stadium of Tarns

  I brought the tarn down behind the tiers in the Stadium of Tarns, in the Readying Compound of the Steels.

  I heard the warning bar for a race about to begin.

  As my bird, with a flash of wings, struck the sand of the compound, four men armed with crossbows rushed forward.

  “Hold!” I cried. “I am of the Steels!”

  Each of those who charged wore upon his shoulder the grayish patch that betokened the faction.

  I found myself covered by their weapons.

  “Who are you!” cried one.

  “Gladius of Cos,” I told them.

  “It may be,” said one, “for he is of the size and build.”

  The crossbows were not lowered.

  “The tarn will know me,” I said.

  I leaped from the back of the tarn I rode and ran through the compound toward the perch of the black tarn.

  Midway I stopped. Near one perch there lay a dead tarn, a small racing tarn, its throat cut. Near it, being tended for wounds, lay its intended rider, groaning. I knew the man. His name was Callius.

  “What is this?” I cried.

  “We enjoyed a visit by the Yellows,” said one of the men grimly. “This tarn was slain and the rider direly wounded. We beat them off.”

  Another of the men gestured with his crossbow menacingly. “If you be not Gladius of Cos,” said he, “you w
ill die.”

  “Do not fear,” I said and grimly strode toward the perch of the great black tarn, the majestic tarn of Ko-ro-ba, my Ubar of the Skies.

  Approaching him we heard a wild tarn scream, of hate and challenge, and we stopped.

  I beheld, in its compound, strewn about its perch, more than five men, or the remains of such.

  “Yellows,” said one of the men with the crossbow, “who tried to slay the bird.”

  “It is a War Tarn,” said another.

  I saw blood on the beak of the bird, its round black eyes, gleaming, wild.

  “Beware,” said one of the men, “even if you be Gladius of Cos, for the tarn has tasted blood.”

  I saw that even the steel-shod talons of the bird were bloodied.

  Watching us warily it stood with one set of talons hooked over the body of a yellow. Then, not taking its eyes from us, it put down its beak and tore an arm from the thing beneath its talons.

  “Do not approach,” said one of the men.

  I stood back. It is not wise to interfere with the feeding of a tarn.

  I heard the judge’s bar ringing three times signaling tarns to the starting perches. I heard the crowd roar.

  “Which race is it?” I asked, suddenly afraid that I might be too late.

  “The eighth,” said one of the men, “that before the Ubar’s Race.”

  “Callius was to have ridden this race,” I said.

  But Callius lay wounded. His tarn was dead.

  “We stand one race behind at the beginning of the eighth,” said one of the men.

  My heart sank. With Callius wounded and tarns at, or near, their perches, the Steels would have no rider. My own tarn, if it could be readied at all, could not be brought to the starting perches before the ninth race, that of the Ubar. The Steels could not, thus, even did they win the Ubar’s race, carry the day.

  “The Steels are done,” said I.

  “But one rides for the Steels,” said one of the crossbowmen.

  I looked at him suddenly.

  “Mip,” said he.

  “The little Tarn Keeper?” I asked skeptically.

  “He,” said the man.

  “But what mount?” I queried.

  “His own,” said the man. “Green Ubar.”

  I was stunned. “The bird is old,” I said. “It has not raced for years.” I looked at them. “And Mip,” I said, “though he knows much of racing is but a Tarn Keeper.”

  One of the men looked at me and smiled.

  Another lifted his crossbow, leveling the weapon at my breast. “He is perhaps a spy of the Yellows,” said he.

  “Perhaps,” agreed the leader of the crossbowmen.

  “How do we know you be Gladius of Cos?” asked another.

  I smiled. “The tarn will know me,” I said.

  “The tarn has tasted blood,” said the leader. “It has killed. It feeds. Do not approach the tarn now or it will mean your death.”

  “We have little time to waste,” I said.

  “Wait!” cried the leader of the crossbowmen.

  I stepped toward the great black tarn. It was at the foot of its perch. It was chained by one foot. The run of the chain was perhaps twenty-five feet. I approached slowly, holding my hands open, saying nothing. It eyed me.

  “The bird does not know him,” said one of the men, he who had suggested I might be a spy of the Yellows.

  “Be still,” whispered the leader of the group.

  “He is a fool,” whispered another.

  “That,” agreed the leader, “or Gladius of Cos.”

  The tarn, the great, fierce saddlebird of Gor, is a savage beast, a monster predator of the high, blue skies of this harsh world; at best it is scarce half domesticated; even tarnsmen seldom approach them without weapons and tarn goad; it is regarded madness to approach one that is feeding; the instincts of the tarn, like those of many predators, are to protect and defend a kill, to the death; Tarn Keepers, with their goads and training wires, have lost their lives with even young birds, trying to alter or correct this covetousness of its quarry; the winged majestic carnivores of Gor, her tarns, do not care to share their kills, until perhaps they have gorged their fill and carry then remnants of their repast to the encliffed nests of the Thentis or Voltai Ranges, there to drop meat into the gaping beaks of white tarnlings, the size of ponies.

  “Stand back!” warned the leader of the men.

  I stepped forward, until I stood within the ambit of the tarn’s chain.

  I spoke softly. “My Ubar of the Skies,” I said, “you know me.” I approached more closely, holding my hands open, not hurrying.

  The bird regarded me. In its beak there hung the body of a Yellow.

  “Come back!” cried one of the crossbowmen, and I was pleased that it was he who had thought I might be a spy for the Yellows. Even he did not care for what might now occur.

  “We must ride, Ubar of the Skies,” said I, approaching the bird.

  I took the body of the man from its beak and laid it to one side.

  The bird did not attempt to strike me.

  I heard the men behind me gasp with wonder.

  “You fought well,” said I to the bird. I caressed its bloodied, scimitarlike beak. “And I am pleased to see you live.”

  The bird gently touched me with its beak.

  “Ready the platform,” said I, “for the next race.”

  “Yes,” said the leader of the men, “Gladius of Cos!” His three companions, putting aside their bows, rushed to prepare the wheeled platform.

  I turned to face the man and he tossed me a leather mask, that which Gladius of Cos wore, that which had, for so many races this fantastic summer, concealed his features. “Mip,” said the man, “told me this was for you.”

  “My gratitude,” I said, drawing the mask over my head.

  I heard the judge’s bar, a bristling fire of wings, and the sudden, wild roar of the crowd. “The eighth race has begun,” said the leader of the crossbowmen.

  I slapped the beak of the bird affectionately. “I shall see you shortly,” said I, “Ubar of the Skies.”

  I strode from the bird’s side and made my way through the readying compound of the Steels until I climbed the stairs inside the low wall separating it from the area leading out onto the broad path leading to the starting perches; I dropped over the wall and made my way across the sand until I came to the dividing wall separating the two sides of the track. I ascended stairs there until I stood, with many others, on the dividing wall, and from there could watch the race. The leader of the crossbowmen in the compound of the Steels followed me.

  I heard cries of astonishment from those I passed. “It is Gladius of Cos!” I heard. “It is he!” “I thought he feared to appear.” “No, Fool, not Gladius of Cos!” “Assassins lurk!” “Flee, Rider, flee!” “Flee, Gladius of Cos!”

  “Be silent,” said the man with me, he who had given me the mask, the leader of the crossbowmen, quieting with his command the cries and admonitions of those about us.

  The birds, some nine of them, only a few feet overhead and to one side, flashed past, wings cracking like whips, beaks extended, the riders hunched low in the saddles. Those on the dividing wall staggered back.

  I caught a glimpse of Green Ubar, Mip in the saddle, lost in the flurry of whipping wings.

  I saw six wooden tarn heads mounted on poles at each end of the dividing wall, indicating the laps remaining.

  Some seventy or eighty yards away I saw the box of the Ubar and, upon the throne of the Ubar, Cernus, of the House of Cernus, in the imperial purple of the Ubar.

  For the moment his attention was distracted from the race, as a messenger, a fellow I had seen but a moment before on the dividing wall, hastened to his side, whispering something in his ear.

  I suddenly saw him look to the dividing wall.

  Masked, I stood there, facing him.

  Angrily he turned to the man and gave him a command.

  Again the furious p
assage of the tarns overhead was marked in the beating of wings, the cries of the riders, now the flash of tarn goads, the turbulence of the air slashed from their path driving against us.

  This time, on the center side ring, a nonfaction tarn was forced into the padded bar by a sudden swerve of Menicius of Port Kar, riding for the Yellows. I had seen him use this several times before. I noted that Mip had been following Menicius, and when Menicius had swerved Mip had taken advantage of the opening thus presented and, like a knife, had plunged for the heart of the ring. The bird that had struck the ring was tumbling stunned into the net. The great heavy ring was swinging on its chains. Menicius, I saw, savagely dragged his bird back to the center of the flight path, cursing, realizing how Mip had waited to take advantage of his momentary surrender of the center.

  The crowd, regardless of which patch they wore, cried out with admiration.

  A tarn of the Reds, a large-winged bird, goaded almost to madness by a small, bearded rider, wearing a bone talisman about his neck, held the lead. He was followed by two brown racing tarns, their riders wearing the silk of the Blues and the Silvers. Then followed Green Ubar, Mip one with the winged beast, high stirrups, his small body hunched down, not giving the bird its head. I wondered at the bird. I knew its age, the diminishment of its strength, that it had not raced in many years. Its feathers lacked the fiery sheen of the young tarn; its beak was not the gleaming yellow of the other birds, but a whitish yellow; its breathing was not that of the other birds; but its eyes were those of the unconquerable tarn, wild, black, fierce; gleaming with pride and fury; determined that no other bird nor beast shall stand before it.

  I feared for the strain on that old heart, redoubtable and valiant.

  “Beware!” cried my fellow, he with the crossbow, and I spun to catch the wrist of a man striking toward my back with a dagger.

  I broke his neck and threw him to the sand at the foot of the dividing wall.

  He was the man who had reported my presence to Cernus, he to whom Cernus had issued an order.

  I turned and regarded the box of the Ubar. Saphronicus, of the Taurentians, stood beside him.

  The hand of Saphronicus was on the hilt of his sword. The fists of Cernus were white, clenched on the arms of the Ubar’s throne.