The planet of peril
trembled and grew weak with the joy of that first kiss of love. And so
it came about that Oro the Mighty made me his mate, and swore that as
there had been no women before me, so should there be none after me.
That I was his, and he was mine, forever and ever. Is it not wonderful?"
"It is wonderful," said Vernia, "to have known your true love, though
for only a day. But will Oro not be punished by the sabits?"
"If he is found out. But we hope that they will never know. During the
night he took the body to the river which fronts the mating pens and,
after weighting it with stones, sank it in deep water. The natural
supposition will be that the man escaped and is either wandering in the
forest or captured by the sabits of some other community."
* * * * *
Vernia and Rotha worked side by side for many days, first in the
incubator room, and later tending and feeding small fantas. It was due
to this change in occupation that Vernia twice avoided the inspection
tours of the king sabit, though she knew he would come eventually and
she could scarcely hope to escape his scrutiny.
She was feeding the sticky stuff to a voracious young fanta one day
when Rotha touched her arm.
"The king sabit comes," she whispered. "Stoop over that he may not
observe you."
Vernia bent low over the wriggling fanta, meanwhile watching the king
sabit from the corner of her eye. He advanced slowly, pausing now and
then to indicate a woman for the pens. At length he came in front of
Vernia, stopped for a moment, then started on. It was her hungry charge
that proved her undoing, for in her preoccupation she held her wrist
too close to the keen mandibles and received a sharp nip.
With a cry of pain she stood erect. The king sabit stopped, turned
back, looked at her fixedly for a moment, then vibrated his antennæ
noiselessly. An accompanying soldier sabit gave the royal edict to
Vernia through an interpreter in the tone-language. She would be
conducted to the mating pens the following evening!
A familiar cackling laugh sounded behind her, and turning she beheld
the wrinkled face and grinning gums of the hag who had previously
taunted her.
"It has come to pass," she rasped, gloatingly. "The proud one will now
bear slave-children for our mighty masters."
Vernia buried her face in her hands with a feeling of despair that she
had never experienced before, even in the pit of the grampites. Her
forgotten charge, having succeeded in smearing itself with food from
end to end, left a white, sticky trail on the floor as it wriggled
away. Rotha came and put her arm about her shoulders.
"Do not give up hope, Vernia of Reabon," she said. "You have a whole
day in which to plan an escape. Remember how miraculously I was
rescued, and take courage."
"Your case was different, Rotha," replied Vernia. "Think you that my
lover will be waiting to rescue me in the mating pens? And what other
recourse have I? I cannot even take my own life, which I would rather
do than obey the order of the king sabit, for I have no weapons--not
even a knife. As for escape, even though I might succeed in getting
into the open, what chance would I have to outdistance the fleet
soldier sabits?"
"Then you, too, have a lover. I might have known it, for one so
beautiful might have a thousand lovers to command. Tell me of him,
Vernia of Reabon."
A most becoming blush crimsoned the face of Vernia.
"I spoke without thought," she said hastily. "There is one who might
have some day been my lover--a brave man from another world who has
rescued me from many terrible creatures. But, alas! I have not seen
him these many days, and though I have hoped against hope, he has not
appeared."
"Oh, but he will come, even as my Oro came, at the moment when all
seemed lost."
"I wish I might have your optimism, but I feel that this time I am
doomed."
* * * * *
A group of powerful hairy men stood conversing in the entrance chamber
of the mating pens on the following day. One great muscular brute,
who towered several inches above the tallest of the others, leered
gloatingly at the surrounding circle.
"And know you, men," he was saying, "that Tholto has received further
recognition from the king sabit, for to-day he has chosen me to mate
with the most beautiful slave-woman ever captured by our masters. In
her own land she was a princess, ruler of the greatest empire in all
Zarovia, yet for a day and a night must she bow to the will of Tholto
the slave."
A short, broad-shouldered man with thick neck and bulging muscles
answered him.
"As usual, our braggart ignores the rights of his fellows. Think you,
Tholto, that there will be none to take advantage of the ancient custom
of the sabits--none to dispute your claim by combat?"
"If there be a man present who dares dispute this woman with Tholto,
let him come now to his death, for the fool will surely die."
"Think not to frighten us with vain boasting, Tholto. We are indolent
now, not from fear, but because we have not seen the woman. If
she proves but half as beautiful as reported, you will not lack
contestants."
A sudden stir in the front of the mating pens followed these words. Two
soldier sabits rushed in, knocking slaves right and left, while a third
carried the limp form of a woman clad in red leather, and deposited its
burden on the floor in front of Tholto.
The sabits left as suddenly as they had come, and a circle of men
formed to look down at the beautiful girl. She had fainted, and as she
lay there, the oval of her perfect features half hidden in the glory
of her disheveled hair, each curve of her slender body eloquent with
the lure of newly-ripened womanhood, small wonder that in the breasts
of those great, hairy savages arose primitive passions that found
expression in low muttering, and dark, challenging looks at the king
sabit's favorite!
CHAPTER XVIII.
AN UNDERGROUND CITY.
Grandon's plan of escape entailed no inconsiderable degree of caution,
as well as an immense amount of physical labor.
The room adjoining the dormitory in which he and his men were quartered
was used for storing the dried fungi which, when mixed with the sticky
milk of the green creatures, constituted the food of the slaves. These
fungi were dumped in great heaps about the room without any semblance
of order, and as one of the heaps effectually concealed a corner, one
side of which was formed by the outer wall, it was Grandon's purpose
to dig a tunnel from this point to a spot he had marked about fifty
feet from the hut, where he could emerge under a large surface root.
The entrance to his tunnel would thus be hidden by the pile of fungi,
while the exit might easily be covered with one of the huge leaves, a
profusion of which lay everywhere about the hut.
Night after night he labored, digging with bare hands and the knife
he had brought from the airship, for he had no tools of any kind. His
fingernails wore down to the quick, his hands were raw and bleeding and
his arms ached. Nevertheless he went doggedly to his task each night
after the others had retired.
After many nights of arduous toil he had completed a slanting tunnel
about eight feet deep, and was digging in a horizontal direction toward
the point where he had calculated the root would be, when his labor was
brought to a sudden, and somewhat painful termination. The floor of his
burrow gave way with startling abruptness. He fell, first striking some
object that gave off a metallic clang, then alighting on a hard, smooth
surface with considerable force.
Dazed for a moment by the violence of his fall, Grandon lay there in
the pitchy darkness with no inkling of what had happened. At length he
essayed to sit up and, meeting with success, arose stiffly to his feet,
for he was badly bruised though fortunately no bones were broken. He
bethought himself now of the flash light which he had kept concealed in
his clothing since the day he had examined the abandoned airship.
The beating of his heart was momentarily stilled by the sight which
greeted his eyes when he turned on the light, for directly in front of
him stood what appeared to be a huge warrior, attired in armor from
head to foot. Closer scrutiny, however, revealed the fact that he faced
an empty suit of armor, for a mailed gauntlet clutching a heavy ax had
fallen from one of the arms, disclosing the empty sleeve. It was this
which had caused the clanging sound he had heard when he struck the
extended arm in falling.
The armor was skillfully wrought of a brownish metal which he at first
took for bronze on account of its appearance, but later discovered
could not be bronze on account of its exceeding hardness. It was of a
pattern unlike anything he had ever seen or heard of, and strikingly
decorated with designs of inlaid gold set with brilliant jewels.
Sharp metal spines projected from the top and back of the grotesque
headpiece, while two large green jewels sparkled just above the
movable visor like the eyes of some multi-horned reptile. In the visor
itself, the true eyeholes were of a hard, thick crystal, and below
them were small perforations to admit air. A huge broadsword hung from
one side of the belt and a short club with a heavy spiked knob dangled
from the other.
On the floor before the figure lay a quantity of loose earth which had
been carried with Grandon in his fall. He flashed the light upward and
its rays revealed a ceiling nearly ten feet above his head, supported
by heavy timbers. He had broken through between two of the large
timbers at a point where the cross pieces were completely rotted away.
* * * * *
Upon examining his surroundings he found that he was in a corridor
about thirty feet in width, and extending in both directions as far as
he could see. A double row of hexagonal columns supported the heavy
ceiling-beams, and before each column stood a figure similar to the
one he had examined, with the exception that every alternate figure
held a long, broad-bladed spear instead of an ax in the extended right
gauntlet.
The Earth-man was in a quandary. He could not return via the opening
through which he had fallen, nor had he any idea into what dangers the
corridor might lead him. From his fellow slaves he had heard legends
of an ancient race of men called Albines, who were said to have at one
time been masters of the sabits.
These Albines, so the legend ran, wore suits of mail which effectually
protected them from the creatures, and made slaves of whole colonies
by raiding them and making prisoners of the queen and king sabits, for
the soldiers and workers, being ever subject to the commands of their
rulers, immediately became docile when the lives of their superiors
were threatened. The Albines had vanished many years before, no one
knew how or why, and the sabits had thenceforth turned the tables on
man by enslaving the marsh-people.
That he had fallen into a structure once used by these people, Grandon
could not doubt, but the question that most concerned him was whether
or not the underground chambers were known to and frequented by the
sabits.
With this contingency in mind, Grandon selected a suit of armor which
appeared to be his size, and after a considerable struggle with the
unfamiliar fastenings, succeeded in donning it. He had expected to
feel stiff and awkward in his metal suit, and was therefore agreeably
surprised when he found it both light and pliable, for though
exceedingly hard and strong, the metal was as light as aluminum and so
fashioned that the interlocking plates easily adjusted themselves to
every movement of his body.