A princess of Mars
chances for gaining a position where I could have defended Dejah Thoris
against an army of swordsmen.
The Tharks were having their hands full in the center of the room, and
I began to realize that nothing short of a miracle could save Dejah
Thoris and myself, when I saw Tars Tarkas surging through the crowd of
pygmies that swarmed about him. With one swing of his mighty longsword
he laid a dozen corpses at his feet, and so he hewed a pathway before
him until in another moment he stood upon the platform beside me,
dealing death and destruction right and left.
The bravery of the Zodangans was awe-inspiring, not one attempted to
escape, and when the fighting ceased it was because only Tharks
remained alive in the great hall, other than Dejah Thoris and myself.
Sab Than lay dead beside his father, and the corpses of the flower of
Zodangan nobility and chivalry covered the floor of the bloody
shambles.
My first thought when the battle was over was for Kantos Kan, and
leaving Dejah Thoris in charge of Tars Tarkas I took a dozen warriors
and hastened to the dungeons beneath the palace. The jailers had all
left to join the fighters in the throne room, so we searched the
labyrinthine prison without opposition.
I called Kantos Kan’s name aloud in each new corridor and compartment,
and finally I was rewarded by hearing a faint response. Guided by the
sound, we soon found him helpless in a dark recess.
He was overjoyed at seeing me, and to know the meaning of the fight,
faint echoes of which had reached his prison cell. He told me that the
air patrol had captured him before he reached the high tower of the
palace, so that he had not even seen Sab Than.
We discovered that it would be futile to attempt to cut away the bars
and chains which held him prisoner, so, at his suggestion I returned to
search the bodies on the floor above for keys to open the padlocks of
his cell and of his chains.
Fortunately among the first I examined I found his jailer, and soon we
had Kantos Kan with us in the throne room.
The sounds of heavy firing, mingled with shouts and cries, came to us
from the city’s streets, and Tars Tarkas hastened away to direct the
fighting without. Kantos Kan accompanied him to act as guide, the green
warriors commencing a thorough search of the palace for other Zodangans
and for loot, and Dejah Thoris and I were left alone.
She had sunk into one of the golden thrones, and as I turned to her she
greeted me with a wan smile.
“Was there ever such a man!” she exclaimed. “I know that Barsoom has
never before seen your like. Can it be that all Earth men are as you?
Alone, a stranger, hunted, threatened, persecuted, you have done in a
few short months what in all the past ages of Barsoom no man has ever
done: joined together the wild hordes of the sea bottoms and brought
them to fight as allies of a red Martian people.”
“The answer is easy, Dejah Thoris,” I replied smiling. “It was not I
who did it, it was love, love for Dejah Thoris, a power that would work
greater miracles than this you have seen.”
A pretty flush overspread her face and she answered,
“You may say that now, John Carter, and I may listen, for I am free.”
“And more still I have to say, ere it is again too late,” I returned.
“I have done many strange things in my life, many things that wiser men
would not have dared, but never in my wildest fancies have I dreamed of
winning a Dejah Thoris for myself—for never had I dreamed that in all
the universe dwelt such a woman as the Princess of Helium. That you are
a princess does not abash me, but that you are you is enough to make me
doubt my sanity as I ask you, my princess, to be mine.”
“He does not need to be abashed who so well knew the answer to his plea
before the plea were made,” she replied, rising and placing her dear
hands upon my shoulders, and so I took her in my arms and kissed her.
And thus in the midst of a city of wild conflict, filled with the
alarms of war; with death and destruction reaping their terrible
harvest around her, did Dejah Thoris, Princess of Helium, true daughter
of Mars, the God of War, promise herself in marriage to John Carter,
Gentleman of Virginia.
CHAPTER XXVI
THROUGH CARNAGE TO JOY
Sometime later Tars Tarkas and Kantos Kan returned to report that
Zodanga had been completely reduced. Her forces were entirely destroyed
or captured, and no further resistance was to be expected from within.
Several battleships had escaped, but there were thousands of war and
merchant vessels under guard of Thark warriors.
The lesser hordes had commenced looting and quarreling among
themselves, so it was decided that we collect what warriors we could,
man as many vessels as possible with Zodangan prisoners and make for
Helium without further loss of time.
Five hours later we sailed from the roofs of the dock buildings with a
fleet of two hundred and fifty battleships, carrying nearly one hundred
thousand green warriors, followed by a fleet of transports with our
thoats.
Behind us we left the stricken city in the fierce and brutal clutches
of some forty thousand green warriors of the lesser hordes. They were
looting, murdering, and fighting amongst themselves. In a hundred
places they had applied the torch, and columns of dense smoke were
rising above the city as though to blot out from the eye of heaven the
horrid sights beneath.
In the middle of the afternoon we sighted the scarlet and yellow towers
of Helium, and a short time later a great fleet of Zodangan battleships
rose from the camps of the besiegers without the city, and advanced to
meet us.
The banners of Helium had been strung from stem to stern of each of our
mighty craft, but the Zodangans did not need this sign to realize that
we were enemies, for our green Martian warriors had opened fire upon
them almost as they left the ground. With their uncanny marksmanship
they raked the on-coming fleet with volley after volley.
The twin cities of Helium, perceiving that we were friends, sent out
hundreds of vessels to aid us, and then began the first real air battle
I had ever witnessed.
The vessels carrying our green warriors were kept circling above the
contending fleets of Helium and Zodanga, since their batteries were
useless in the hands of the Tharks who, having no navy, have no skill
in naval gunnery. Their small-arm fire, however, was most effective,
and the final outcome of the engagement was strongly influenced, if not
wholly determined, by their presence.
At first the two forces circled at the same altitude, pouring broadside
after broadside into each other. Presently a great hole was torn in the
hull of one of the immense battle craft from the Zodangan camp; with a
lurch she turned completely over, the little figures of her crew
plunging, turning and twisting toward the ground a thousand feet below;
then with sickening velocity she tore after them, almost completely
burying herself in the soft loam of the ancient sea bottom.
A wild cry of exultation arose from the Heliumite squadron, and with
redoubled ferocity they fell upon the Zodangan fleet. By a pretty
maneuver two of the vessels of Helium gained a position above their
adversaries, from which they poured upon them from their keel bomb
batteries a perfect torrent of exploding bombs.
Then, one by one, the battleships of Helium succeeded in rising above
the Zodangans, and in a short time a number of the beleaguering
battleships were drifting hopeless wrecks toward the high scarlet tower
of greater Helium. Several others attempted to escape, but they were
soon surrounded by thousands of tiny individual fliers, and above each
hung a monster battleship of Helium ready to drop boarding parties upon
their decks.
Within but little more than an hour from the moment the victorious
Zodangan squadron had risen to meet us from the camp of the besiegers
the battle was over, and the remaining vessels of the conquered
Zodangans were headed toward the cities of Helium under prize crews.
There was an extremely pathetic side to the surrender of these mighty
fliers, the result of an age-old custom which demanded that surrender
should be signalized by the voluntary plunging to earth of the
commander of the vanquished vessel. One after another the brave
fellows, holding their colors high above their heads, leaped from the
towering bows of their mighty craft to an awful death.
Not until the commander of the entire fleet took the fearful plunge,
thus indicating the surrender of the remaining vessels, did the
fighting cease, and the useless sacrifice of brave men come to an end.
We now signaled the flagship of Helium’s navy to approach, and when she
was within hailing distance I called out that we had the Princess Dejah
Thoris on board, and that we wished to transfer her to the flagship
that she might be taken immediately to the city.
As the full import of my announcement bore in upon them a great cry
arose from the decks of the flagship, and a moment later the colors of
the Princess of Helium broke from a hundred points upon her upper
works. When the other vessels of the squadron caught the meaning of the
signals flashed them they took up the wild acclaim and unfurled her
colors in the gleaming sunlight.
The flagship bore down upon us, and as she swung gracefully to and
touched our side a dozen officers sprang upon our decks. As their
astonished gaze fell upon the hundreds of green warriors, who now came
forth from the fighting shelters, they stopped aghast, but at sight of
Kantos Kan, who advanced to meet them, they came forward, crowding
about him.
Dejah Thoris and I then advanced, and they had no eyes for other than
her. She received them gracefully, calling each by name, for they were
men high in the esteem and service of her grandfather, and she knew
them well.
“Lay your hands upon the shoulder of John Carter,” she said to them,
turning toward me, “the man to whom Helium owes her princess as well as
her victory today.”
They were very courteous to me and said many kind and complimentary
things, but what seemed to impress them most was that I had won the aid
of the fierce Tharks in my campaign for the liberation of Dejah Thoris,
and the relief of Helium.
“You owe your thanks more to another man than to me,” I said, “and here
he is; meet one of Barsoom’s greatest soldiers and statesmen, Tars
Tarkas, Jeddak of Thark.”
With the same polished courtesy that had marked their manner toward me
they extended their greetings to the great Thark, nor, to my surprise,
was he much behind them in ease of bearing or in courtly speech. Though
not a garrulous race, the Tharks are extremely formal, and their ways
lend themselves amazingly to dignified and courtly manners.
Dejah Thoris went aboard the flagship, and was much put out that I
would not follow, but, as I explained to her, the battle was but partly
won; we still had the land forces of the besieging Zodangans to account
for, and I would not leave Tars Tarkas until that had been
accomplished.
The commander of the naval forces of Helium promised to arrange to have
the armies of Helium attack from the city in conjunction with our land
attack, and so the vessels separated and Dejah Thoris was borne in
triumph back to the court of her grandfather, Tardos Mors, Jeddak of
Helium.
In the distance lay our fleet of transports, with the thoats of the
green warriors, where they had remained during the battle. Without
landing stages it was to be a difficult matter to unload these beasts
upon the open plain, but there was nothing else for it, and so we put
out for a point about ten miles from the city and began the task.
It was necessary to lower the animals to the ground in slings and this