The Chessmen of Mars
saw the sleeping silks and furs upon the central dais move. He saw a
figure slowly arising to a sitting posture from the death bed of O-Mai
the Cruel. His knees shook, but he gathered all his moral forces, and
gripping his sword more tightly in his trembling fingers prepared to
leap across the chamber upon the horrid apparition. He hesitated just a
moment. He felt eyes upon him--ghoulish eyes that bored through the
darkness into his withering heart--eyes that he could not see. He
gathered himself for the rush--and then there broke from the thing upon
the couch an awful shriek, and O-Tar sank senseless to the floor.
Gahan rose from the couch of O-Mai, smiling, only to swing quickly
about with drawn sword as the shadow of a noise impinged upon his keen
ears from the shadows behind him. Between the parted hangings he saw a
bent and wrinkled figure. It was I-Gos.
"Sheathe your sword, Turan," said the old man. "You have naught to fear
from I-Gos."
"What do you here?" demanded Gahan.
"I came to make sure that the great coward did not cheat us. Ey, and he
called me 'doddering fool;' but look at him now! Stricken insensible by
terror, but, ey, one might forgive him that who had heard your uncanny
scream. It all but blasted my own courage. And it was you, then, who
moaned and screamed when the chiefs came the day that I stole Tara from
you?"
"It was you, then, old scoundrel?" demanded Gahan, moving threateningly
toward I-Gos.
"Come, come!" expostulated the old man; "it was I, but then I was your
enemy. I would not do it now. Conditions have changed."
"How have they changed? What has changed them?" asked Gahan.
"Then I did not fully realize the cowardice of my jeddak, or the
bravery of you and the girl. I am an old man from another age and I
love courage. At first I resented the girl's attack upon me, but later
I came to see the bravery of it and it won my admiration, as have all
her acts. She feared not O-Tar, she feared not me, she feared not all
the warriors of Manator. And you! Blood of a million sires! how you
fight! I am sorry that I exposed you at The Fields of Jetan. I am sorry
that I dragged the girl Tara back to O-Tar. I would make amends. I
would be your friend. Here is my sword at your feet," and drawing his
weapon I-Gos cast it to the floor in front of Gahan.
The Gatholian knew that scarce the most abandoned of knaves would
repudiate this solemn pledge, and so he stooped, and picking up the old
man's sword returned it to him, hilt first, in acceptance of his
friendship.
"Where is the Princess Tara of Helium?" asked Gahan. "Is she safe?"
"She is confined in the tower of the women's quarters awaiting the
ceremony that is to make her Jeddara of Manator," replied I-Gos.
"This thing dared think that Tara of Helium would mate with him?"
growled Gahan. "I will make short work of him if he is not already dead
from fright," and he stepped toward the fallen O-Tar to run his sword
through the jeddak's heart.
"No!" cried I-Gos. "Slay him not and pray that he be not dead if you
would save your princess."
"How is that?" asked Gahan.
"If word of O-Tar's death reached the quarters of the women the
Princess Tara would be lost. They know O-Tar's intention of taking her
to wife and making her Jeddara of Manator, so you may rest assured that
they all hate her with the hate of jealous women. Only O-Tar's power
protects her now from harm. Should O-Tar die they would turn her over
to the warriors and the male slaves, for there would be none to avenge
her."
Gahan sheathed his sword. "Your point is well taken; but what shall we
do with him?"
"Leave him where he lies," counseled I-Gos. "He is not dead. When he
revives he will return to his quarters with a fine tale of his bravery
and there will be none to impugn his boasts--none but I-Gos. Come! he
may revive at any moment and he must not find us here."
I-Gos crossed to the body of his jeddak, knelt beside it for an
instant, and then returned past the couch to Gahan. The two quit the
chamber of O-Mai and took their way toward the spiral runway. Here
I-Gos led Gahan to a higher level and out upon the roof of that portion
of the palace from where he pointed to a high tower quite close by.
"There," he said, "lies the Princess of Helium, and quite safe she will
be until the time of the ceremony."
"Safe, possibly, from other hands, but not from her own," said Gahan.
"She will never become Jeddara of Manator--first will she destroy
herself."
"She would do that?" asked I-Gos.
"She will, unless you can get word to her that I still live and that
there is yet hope," replied Gahan.
"I cannot get word to her," said I-Gos. "The quarters of his women
O-Tar guards with jealous hand. Here are his most trusted slaves and
warriors, yet even so, thick among them are countless spies, so that no
man knows which be which. No shadow falls within those chambers that is
not marked by a hundred eyes."
Gahan stood gazing at the lighted windows of the high tower in the
upper chambers of which Tara of Helium was confined. "I will find a
way, I-Gos," he said.
"There is no way," replied the old man.
For some time they stood upon the roof beneath the brilliant stars and
hurtling moons of dying Mars, laying their plans against the time that
Tara of Helium should be brought from the high tower to the throne room
of O-Tar. It was then, and then alone, argued I-Gos, that any hope of
rescuing her might be entertained. Just how far he might trust the
other Gahan did not know, and so he kept to himself the knowledge of
the plan that he had forwarded to Floran and Val Dor by Ghek, but he
assured the ancient taxidermist that if he were sincere in his
oft-repeated declaration that O-Tar should be denounced and superseded
he would have his opportunity on the night that the jeddak sought to
wed the Heliumetic princess.
"Your time shall come then, I-Gos," Gahan assured the other, "and if
you have any party that thinks as you do, prepare them for the
eventuality that will succeed O-Tar's presumptuous attempt to wed the
daughter of The Warlord. Where shall I see you again, and when? I go
now to speak with Tara, Princess of Helium."
"I like your boldness," said I-Gos; "but it will avail you naught. You
will not speak with Tara, Princess of Helium, though doubtless the
blood of many Manatorians will drench the floors of the women's
quarters before you are slain."
Gahan smiled. "I shall not be slain. Where and when shall we meet? But
you may find me in O-Mai's chamber at night. That seems the safest
retreat in all Manator for an enemy of the jeddak in whose palace it
lies. I go!"
"And may the spirits of your ancestors surround you," said I-Gos.
After the old man had left him Gahan made his way across the roof to
the high tower, which appeared to have been constructed of concrete and
afterward elaborately carved, its entire surface being covered with
intricate designs cut deep into the stone-like material of which it was
composed. Though wrought ages since, it was but little weather-worn
owing to the aridity of the Martian atmosphere, the infrequency of
rains, and the rarity of dust storms. To scale it, though, presented
difficulties and danger that might have deterred the bravest of
men--that would, doubtless, have deterred Gahan, had he not felt that
the life of the woman he loved depended upon his accomplishing the
hazardous feat.
Removing his sandals and laying aside all of his harness and weapons
other than a single belt supporting a dagger, the Gatholian essayed the
dangerous ascent. Clinging to the carvings with hands and feet he
worked himself slowly aloft, avoiding the windows and keeping upon the
shadowy side of the tower, away from the light of Thuria and Cluros.
The tower rose some fifty feet above the roof of the adjacent part of
the palace, comprising five levels or floors with windows looking in
every direction. A few of the windows were balconied, and these more
than the others he sought to avoid, although, it being now near the
close of the ninth zode, there was little likelihood that many were
awake within the tower.
His progress was noiseless and he came at last, undetected, to the
windows of the upper level. These, like several of the others he had
passed at lower levels, were heavily barred, so that there was no
possibility of his gaining ingress to the apartment where Tara was
confined. Darkness hid the interior behind the first window that he
approached. The second opened upon a lighted chamber where he could see
a guard sleeping at his post outside a door. Here also was the top of
the runway leading to the next level below. Passing still farther
around the tower Gahan approached another window, but now he clung to
that side of the tower which ended in a courtyard a hundred feet below
and in a short time the light of Thuria would reach him. He realized
that he must hasten and he prayed that behind the window he now
approached he would find Tara of Helium.
Coming to the opening he looked in upon a small chamber dimly lighted.
In the center was a sleeping dais upon which a human form lay beneath
silks and furs. A bare arm, protruding from the coverings, lay exposed
against a black and yellow striped orluk skin--an arm of wondrous
beauty about which was clasped an armlet that Gahan knew. No other
creature was visible within the chamber, all of which was exposed to
Gahan's view. Pressing his face to the bars the Gatholian whispered her
dear name. The girl stirred, but did not awaken. Again he called, but
this time louder. Tara sat up and looked about and at the same instant
a huge eunuch leaped to his feet from where he had been lying on the
floor close by that side of the dais farthest from Gahan.
Simultaneously the brilliant light of Thuria flashed full upon the
window where Gahan clung silhouetting him plainly to the two within.
Both sprang to their feet. The eunuch drew his sword and leaped for the
window where the helpless Gahan would have fallen an easy victim to a
single thrust of the murderous weapon the fellow bore, had not Tara of
Helium leaped upon her guard dragging him back. At the same time she
drew the slim dagger from its hiding place in her harness and even as
the eunuch sought to hurl her aside its keen point found his heart.
Without a sound he died and lunged forward to the floor. Then Tara ran
to the window.
"Turan, my chief!" she cried. "What awful risk is this you take to seek
me here, where even your brave heart is powerless to aid me."
"Be not so sure of that, heart of my heart," he replied. "While I bring
but words to my love, they be the forerunner of deeds, I hope, that
will give her back to me forever. I feared that you might destroy
yourself, Tara of Helium, to escape the dishonor that O-Tar would do
you, and so I came to give you new hope and to beg that you live for me
through whatever may transpire, in the knowledge that there is yet a
way and that if all goes well we shall be freed at last. Look for me in
the throne room of O-Tar the night that he would wed you. And now, how
may we dispose of this fellow?" He pointed to the dead eunuch upon the
floor.
"We need not concern ourselves about that," she replied. "None dares
harm me for fear of the wrath of O-Tar--otherwise I should have been
dead so soon as ever I entered this portion of the palace, for the
women hate me. O-Tar alone may punish me, and what cares O-Tar for the
life of a eunuch? No, fear not upon this score."
Their hands were clasped between the bars and now Gahan drew her nearer
to him.
"One kiss," he said, "before I go, my princess," and the proud daughter
of Dejah Thoris, Princess of Helium, and The Warlord of Barsoom
whispered: "My chieftain!" and pressed her lips to the lips of Turan,
the common panthan.