The gods of Mars
the enemy take the awful, sickening dive which proclaims its total
destruction. Slowly we manoeuvered our circle of death until we hung
above the gardens where our green warriors were engaged. The order was
passed down for them to embark. Then they rose slowly to a position
within the centre of the circle.
In the meantime the therns’ fire had practically ceased. They had had
enough of us and were only too glad to let us go on our way in peace.
But our escape was not to be encompassed with such ease, for scarcely
had we gotten under way once more in the direction of the entrance to
Omean than we saw far to the north a great black line topping the
horizon. It could be nothing other than a fleet of war.
Whose or whither bound, we could not even conjecture. When they had
come close enough to make us out at all, Kantos Kan’s operator received
a radio-aerogram, which he immediately handed to my companion. He read
the thing and handed it to me.
“Kantos Kan:” it read. “Surrender, in the name of the Jeddak of Helium,
for you cannot escape,” and it was signed, “Zat Arras.”
The therns must have caught and translated the message almost as soon
as did we, for they immediately renewed hostilities when they realized
that we were soon to be set upon by other enemies.
Before Zat Arras had approached near enough to fire a shot we were
again hotly engaged with the thern fleet, and as soon as he drew near
he too commenced to pour a terrific fusillade of heavy shot into us.
Ship after ship reeled and staggered into uselessness beneath the
pitiless fire that we were undergoing.
The thing could not last much longer. I ordered the transports to
descend again into the gardens of the therns.
“Wreak your vengeance to the utmost,” was my message to the green
allies, “for by night there will be none left to avenge your wrongs.”
Presently I saw the ten battleships that had been ordered to hold the
shaft of Omean. They were returning at full speed, firing their stern
batteries almost continuously. There could be but one explanation. They
were being pursued by another hostile fleet. Well, the situation could
be no worse. The expedition already was doomed. No man that had
embarked upon it would return across that dreary ice cap. How I wished
that I might face Zat Arras with my longsword for just an instant
before I died! It was he who had caused our failure.
As I watched the oncoming ten I saw their pursuers race swiftly into
sight. It was another great fleet; for a moment I could not believe my
eyes, but finally I was forced to admit that the most fatal calamity
had overtaken the expedition, for the fleet I saw was none other than
the fleet of the First Born, that should have been safely bottled up in
Omean. What a series of misfortunes and disasters! What awful fate
hovered over me, that I should have been so terribly thwarted at every
angle of my search for my lost love! Could it be possible that the
curse of Issus was upon me! That there was, indeed, some malign
divinity in that hideous carcass! I would not believe it, and, throwing
back my shoulders, I ran to the deck below to join my men in repelling
boarders from one of the thern craft that had grappled us broadside. In
the wild lust of hand-to-hand combat my old dauntless hopefulness
returned. And as thern after thern went down beneath my blade, I could
almost feel that we should win success in the end, even from apparent
failure.
My presence among the men so greatly inspirited them that they fell
upon the luckless whites with such terrible ferocity that within a few
moments we had turned the tables upon them and a second later as we
swarmed their own decks I had the satisfaction of seeing their
commander take the long leap from the bows of his vessel in token of
surrender and defeat.
Then I joined Kantos Kan. He had been watching what had taken place on
the deck below, and it seemed to have given him a new thought.
Immediately he passed an order to one of his officers, and presently
the colours of the Prince of Helium broke from every point of the
flagship. A great cheer arose from the men of our own ship, a cheer
that was taken up by every other vessel of our expedition as they in
turn broke my colours from their upper works.
Then Kantos Kan sprang his coup. A signal legible to every sailor of
all the fleets engaged in that fierce struggle was strung aloft upon
the flagship.
“Men of Helium for the Prince of Helium against all his enemies,” it
read. Presently my colours broke from one of Zat Arras’ ships. Then
from another and another. On some we could see fierce battles waging
between the Zodangan soldiery and the Heliumetic crews, but eventually
the colours of the Prince of Helium floated above every ship that had
followed Zat Arras upon our trail—only his flagship flew them not.
Zat Arras had brought five thousand ships. The sky was black with the
three enormous fleets. It was Helium against the field now, and the
fight had settled to countless individual duels. There could be little
or no manoeuvering of fleets in that crowded, fire-split sky.
Zat Arras’ flagship was close to my own. I could see the thin features
of the man from where I stood. His Zodangan crew was pouring broadside
after broadside into us and we were returning their fire with equal
ferocity. Closer and closer came the two vessels until but a few yards
intervened. Grapplers and boarders lined the contiguous rails of each.
We were preparing for the death struggle with our hated enemy.
There was but a yard between the two mighty ships as the first
grappling irons were hurled. I rushed to the deck to be with my men as
they boarded. Just as the vessels came together with a slight shock, I
forced my way through the lines and was the first to spring to the deck
of Zat Arras’ ship. After me poured a yelling, cheering, cursing throng
of Helium’s best fighting-men. Nothing could withstand them in the
fever of battle lust which enthralled them.
Down went the Zodangans before that surging tide of war, and as my men
cleared the lower decks I sprang to the forward deck where stood Zat
Arras.
“You are my prisoner, Zat Arras,” I cried. “Yield and you shall have
quarter.”
For a moment I could not tell whether he contemplated acceding to my
demand or facing me with drawn sword. For an instant he stood
hesitating, and then throwing down his arms he turned and rushed to the
opposite side of the deck. Before I could overtake him he had sprung to
the rail and hurled himself headforemost into the awful depths below.
And thus came Zat Arras, Jed of Zodanga, to his end.
On and on went that strange battle. The therns and blacks had not
combined against us. Wherever thern ship met ship of the First Born was
a battle royal, and in this I thought I saw our salvation. Wherever
messages could be passed between us that could not be intercepted by
our enemies I passed the word that all our vessels were to withdraw
from the fight as rapidly as possible, taking a position to the west
and south of the combatants. I also sent an air scout to the fighting
green men in the gardens below to re-embark, and to the transports to
join us.
My commanders were further instructed that when engaged with an enemy
to draw him as rapidly as possible toward a ship of his hereditary
foeman, and by careful manoeuvring to force the two to engage, thus
leaving himself free to withdraw. This stratagem worked to perfection,
and just before the sun went down I had the satisfaction of seeing all
that was left of my once mighty fleet gathered nearly twenty miles
southwest of the still terrific battle between the blacks and whites.
I now transferred Xodar to another battleship and sent him with all the
transports and five thousand battleships directly overhead to the
Temple of Issus. Carthoris and I, with Kantos Kan, took the remaining
ships and headed for the entrance to Omean.
Our plan now was to attempt to make a combined assault upon Issus at
dawn of the following day. Tars Tarkas with his green warriors and Hor
Vastus with the red men, guided by Xodar, were to land within the
garden of Issus or the surrounding plains; while Carthoris, Kantos Kan,
and I were to lead our smaller force from the sea of Omean through the
pits beneath the temple, which Carthoris knew so well.
I now learned for the first time the cause of my ten ships’ retreat
from the mouth of the shaft. It seemed that when they had come upon the
shaft the navy of the First Born were already issuing from its mouth.
Fully twenty vessels had emerged, and though they gave battle
immediately in an effort to stem the tide that rolled from the black
pit, the odds against them were too great and they were forced to flee.
With great caution we approached the shaft, under cover of darkness. At
a distance of several miles I caused the fleet to be halted, and from
there Carthoris went ahead alone upon a one-man flier to reconnoitre.
In perhaps half an hour he returned to report that there was no sign of
a patrol boat or of the enemy in any form, and so we moved swiftly and
noiselessly forward once more toward Omean.
At the mouth of the shaft we stopped again for a moment for all the
vessels to reach their previously appointed stations, then with the
flagship I dropped quickly into the black depths, while one by one the
other vessels followed me in quick succession.
We had decided to stake all on the chance that we would be able to
reach the temple by the subterranean way and so we left no guard of
vessels at the shaft’s mouth. Nor would it have profited us any to have
done so, for we did not have sufficient force all told to have
withstood the vast navy of the First Born had they returned to engage
us.
For the safety of our entrance upon Omean we depended largely upon the
very boldness of it, believing that it would be some little time before
the First Born on guard there would realize that it was an enemy and
not their own returning fleet that was entering the vault of the buried
sea.
And such proved to be the case. In fact, four hundred of my fleet of
five hundred rested safely upon the bosom of Omean before the first
shot was fired. The battle was short and hot, but there could have been
but one outcome, for the First Born in the carelessness of fancied
security had left but a handful of ancient and obsolete hulks to guard
their mighty harbour.
It was at Carthoris’ suggestion that we landed our prisoners under
guard upon a couple of the larger islands, and then towed the ships of
the First Born to the shaft, where we managed to wedge a number of them
securely in the interior of the great well. Then we turned on the
buoyance rays in the balance of them and let them rise by themselves to
further block the passage to Omean as they came into contact with the
vessels already lodged there.
We now felt that it would be some time at least before the returning
First Born could reach the surface of Omean, and that we would have
ample opportunity to make for the subterranean passages which lead to
Issus. One of the first steps I took was to hasten personally with a
good-sized force to the island of the submarine, which I took without
resistance on the part of the small guard there.
I found the submarine in its pool, and at once placed a strong guard
upon it and the island, where I remained to wait the coming of
Carthoris and the others.
Among the prisoners was Yersted, commander of the submarine. He
recognized me from the three trips that I had taken with him during my
captivity among the First Born.
“How does it seem,” I asked him, “to have the tables turned? To be
prisoner of your erstwhile captive?”
He smiled, a very grim smile pregnant with hidden meaning.
“It will not be for long, John Carter,” he replied. “We have been