Thuvia, maid of Mars
were close to accomplishing their designs upon me.”
She was about to make some reply when a fearful shriek broke from the
lips of the Lotharian.
“The end is coming!” he cried. “The end is coming! The floor! The
floor! Oh, Komal, be merciful!”
Thuvia and Carthoris did not need to look at the floor to be aware of
the strange movement that was taking place.
Slowly the marble flagging was sinking in all directions toward the
centre. At first the movement, being gradual, was scarce noticeable;
but presently the angle of the floor became such that one might stand
easily only by bending one knee considerably.
Jav was shrieking still, and clawing at the royal couch that had
already commenced to slide toward the centre of the room, where both
Thuvia and Carthoris suddenly noted a small orifice which grew in
diameter as the floor assumed more closely a funnel-like contour.
Now it became more and more difficult to cling to the dizzy inclination
of the smooth and polished marble.
Carthoris tried to support Thuvia, but himself commenced to slide and
slip toward the ever-enlarging aperture.
Better to cling to the smooth stone he kicked off his sandals of
zitidar hide and with his bare feet braced himself against the
sickening tilt, at the same time throwing his arms supportingly about
the girl.
In her terror her own hands clasped about the man’s neck. Her cheek was
close to his. Death, unseen and of unknown form, seemed close upon
them, and because unseen and unknowable infinitely more terrifying.
“Courage, my princess,” he whispered.
She looked up into his face to see smiling lips above hers and brave
eyes, untouched by terror, drinking deeply of her own.
Then the floor sagged and tilted more swiftly. There was a sudden
slipping rush as they were precipitated toward the aperture.
Jav’s screams rose weird and horrible in their ears, and then the three
found themselves piled upon the royal couch of Tario, which had stuck
within the aperture at the base of the marble funnel.
For a moment they breathed more freely, but presently they discovered
that the aperture was continuing to enlarge. The couch slipped
downward. Jav shrieked again. There was a sickening sensation as they
felt all let go beneath them, as they fell through darkness to an
unknown death.
CHAPTER IX.
THE BATTLE IN THE PLAIN
The distance from the bottom of the funnel to the floor of the chamber
beneath it could not have been great, for all three of the victims of
Tario’s wrath alighted unscathed.
Carthoris, still clasping Thuvia tightly to his breast, came to the
ground catlike, upon his feet, breaking the shock for the girl. Scarce
had his feet touched the rough stone flagging of this new chamber than
his sword flashed out ready for instant use. But though the room was
lighted, there was no sign of enemy about.
Carthoris looked toward Jav. The man was pasty white with fear.
“What is to be our fate?” asked the Heliumite. “Tell me, man! Shake off
your terror long enough to tell me, so I may be prepared to sell my
life and that of the Princess of Ptarth as dearly as possible.”
“Komal!” whispered Jav. “We are to be devoured by Komal!”
“Your deity?” asked Carthoris.
The Lotharian nodded his head. Then he pointed toward a low doorway at
one end of the chamber.
“From thence will he come upon us. Lay aside your puny sword, fool. It
will but enrage him the more and make our sufferings the worse.”
Carthoris smiled, gripping his long-sword the more firmly.
Presently Jav gave a horrified moan, at the same time pointing toward
the door.
“He has come,” he whimpered.
Carthoris and Thuvia looked in the direction the Lotharian had
indicated, expecting to see some strange and fearful creature in human
form; but to their astonishment they saw the broad head and great-maned
shoulders of a huge banth, the largest that either ever had seen.
Slowly and with dignity the mighty beast advanced into the room. Jav
had fallen to the floor, and was wriggling his body in the same servile
manner that he had adopted toward Tario. He spoke to the fierce beast
as he would have spoken to a human being, pleading with it for mercy.
Carthoris stepped between Thuvia and the banth, his sword ready to
contest the beast’s victory over them. Thuvia turned toward Jav.
“Is this Komal, your god?” she asked.
Jav nodded affirmatively. The girl smiled, and then, brushing past
Carthoris, she stepped swiftly toward the growling carnivore.
In low, firm tones she spoke to it as she had spoken to the banths of
the Golden Cliffs and the scavengers before the walls of Lothar.
The beast ceased its growling. With lowered head and catlike purr, it
came slinking to the girl’s feet. Thuvia turned toward Carthoris.
“It is but a banth,” she said. “We have nothing to fear from it.”
Carthoris smiled.
“I did not fear it,” he replied, “for I, too, believed it to be only a
banth, and I have my long-sword.”
Jav sat up and gazed at the spectacle before him—the slender girl
weaving her fingers in the tawny mane of the huge creature that he had
thought divine, while Komal rubbed his hideous snout against her side.
“So this is your god!” laughed Thuvia.
Jav looked bewildered. He scarce knew whether he dare chance offending
Komal or not, for so strong is the power of superstition that even
though we know that we have been reverencing a sham, yet still we
hesitate to admit the validity of our new-found convictions.
“Yes,” he said, “this is Komal. For ages the enemies of Tario have been
hurled to this pit to fill his maw, for Komal must be fed.”
“Is there any way out of this chamber to the avenues of the city?”
asked Carthoris.
Jav shrugged.
“I do not know,” he replied. “Never have I been here before, nor ever
have I cared to do so.”
“Come,” suggested Thuvia, “let us explore. There must be a way out.”
Together the three approached the doorway through which Komal had
entered the apartment that was to have witnessed their deaths. Beyond
was a low-roofed lair, with a small door at the far end.
This, to their delight, opened to the lifting of an ordinary latch,
letting them into a circular arena, surrounded by tiers of seats.
“Here is where Komal is fed in public,” explained Jav. “Had Tario dared
it would have been here that our fates had been sealed; but he feared
too much thy keen blade, red man, and so he hurled us all downward to
the pit. I did not know how closely connected were the two chambers.
Now we may easily reach the avenues and the city gates. Only the bowmen
may dispute the right of way, and, knowing their secret, I doubt that
they have power to harm us.”
Another door led to a flight of steps that rose from the arena level
upward through the seats to an exit at the back of the hall. Beyond
this was a straight, broad corridor, running directly through the
palace to the gardens at the side.
No one appeared to question them as they advanced, mighty Komal pacing
by the girl’s side.
“Where are the people of the palace—the jeddak’s retinue?” asked
Carthoris. “Even in the city streets as we came through I scarce saw
sign of a human being, yet all about are evidences of a mighty
population.”
Jav sighed.
“Poor Lothar,” he said. “It is indeed a city of ghosts. There are
scarce a thousand of us left, who once were numbered in the millions.
Our great city is peopled by the creatures of our own imaginings. For
our own needs we do not take the trouble to materialize these peoples
of our brain, yet they are apparent to us.
“Even now I see great throngs lining the avenue, hastening to and fro
in the round of their duties. I see women and children laughing on the
balconies—these we are forbidden to materialize; but yet I see
them—they are here. . . . But why not?” he mused. “No longer need I
fear Tario—he has done his worst, and failed. Why not indeed?
“Stay, friends,” he continued. “Would you see Lothar in all her glory?”
Carthoris and Thuvia nodded their assent, more out of courtesy than
because they fully grasped the import of his mutterings.
Jav gazed at them penetratingly for an instant, then, with a wave of
his hand, cried: “Look!”
The sight that met them was awe-inspiring. Where before there had been
naught but deserted pavements and scarlet swards, yawning windows and
tenantless doors, now swarmed a countless multitude of happy, laughing
people.
“It is the past,” said Jav in a low voice. “They do not see us—they but
live the old dead past of ancient Lothar—the dead and crumbled Lothar
of antiquity, which stood upon the shore of Throxus, mightiest of the
five oceans.
“See those fine, upstanding men swinging along the broad avenue? See
the young girls and the women smile upon them? See the men greet them
with love and respect? Those be seafarers coming up from their ships
which lie at the quays at the city’s edge.
“Brave men, they—ah, but the glory of Lothar has faded! See their
weapons. They alone bore arms, for they crossed the five seas to
strange places where dangers were. With their passing passed the
martial spirit of the Lotharians, leaving, as the ages rolled by, a
race of spineless cowards.
“We hated war, and so we trained not our youth in warlike ways. Thus
followed our undoing, for when the seas dried and the green hordes
encroached upon us we could do naught but flee. But we remembered the
seafaring bowmen of the days of our glory—it is the memory of these
which we hurl upon our enemies.”
As Jav ceased speaking, the picture faded, and once more, the three
took up their way toward the distant gates, along deserted avenues.
Twice they sighted Lotharians of flesh and blood. At sight of them and
the huge banth which they must have recognized as Komal, the citizens
turned and fled.
“They will carry word of our flight to Tario,” cried Jav, “and soon he
will send his bowmen after us. Let us hope that our theory is correct,
and that their shafts are powerless against minds cognizant of their
unreality. Otherwise we are doomed.
“Explain, red man, to the woman the truths that I have explained to
you, that she may meet the arrows with a stronger counter-suggestion of
immunity.”
Carthoris did as Jav bid him; but they came to the great gates without
sign of pursuit developing. Here Jav set in motion the mechanism that
rolled the huge, wheel-like gate aside, and a moment later the three,
accompanied by the banth, stepped out into the plain before Lothar.
Scarce had they covered a hundred yards when the sound of many men
shouting arose behind them. As they turned they saw a company of bowmen
debouching upon the plain from the gate through which they had but just
passed.
Upon the wall above the gate were a number of Lotharians, among whom
Jav recognized Tario. The jeddak stood glaring at them, evidently
concentrating all the forces of his trained mind upon them. That he was
making a supreme effort to render his imaginary creatures deadly was
apparent.
Jav turned white, and commenced to tremble. At the crucial moment he
appeared to lose the courage of his conviction. The great banth turned
back toward the advancing bowmen and growled. Carthoris placed himself
between Thuvia and the enemy and, facing them, awaited the outcome of
their charge.
Suddenly an inspiration came to Carthoris.
“Hurl your own bowmen against Tario’s!” he cried to Jav. “Let us see a
materialized battle between two mentalities.”
The suggestion seemed to hearten the Lotharian, and in another moment
the three stood behind solid ranks of huge bowmen who hurled taunts and
menaces at the advancing company emerging from the walled city.
Jav was a new man the moment his battalions stood between him and
Tario. One could almost have sworn the man believed these creatures of