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"It is what the slaves from Gathol have told me," said A-Kor, thoughtfully, "and
my mother, before O-Tar sent her to live at Manatos. I think he must have feared
her power and influence among the slaves from Gathol and their descendants,
who number perhaps a million people throughout the land of Manator."
"Are these slaves organized?" asked Turan.
A-Kor looked straight into the eyes of the panthan for a long moment before he
replied. "You are a man of honor," he said; "I read it in your face, and I am seldom
mistaken in my estimate of a man; but--" and he leaned closer to the other--"even
the walls have ears," he whispered, and Turan's question was answered.
It was later in the evening that warriors came and unlocked the fetter from
Turan's ankle and led him away to appear before O-Tar, the jeddak. They
conducted him toward the palace along narrow, winding streets and broad
avenues; but always from the balconies there looked down upon them in endless
ranks the silent people of the city. The palace itself was filled with life and
activity. Mounted warriors galloped through the corridors and up and down the
runways connecting adjacent floors. It seemed that no one walked within the
palace other than a few slaves. Squealing, fighting thoats were stabled in
magnificent halls while their riders, if not upon some duty of the palace, played at
jetan with small figures carved from wood.
Turan noted the magnificence of the interior architecture of the palace, the lavish
expenditure of precious jewels and metals, the gorgeous mural decorations which
depicted almost exclusively martial scenes, and principally duels which seemed to
be fought upon jetan boards of heroic size. The capitals of many of the columns
supporting the ceilings of the corridors and chambers through which they passed
were wrought into formal likenesses of jetan pieces--everywhere there seemed a
suggestion of the game. Along the same path that Tara of Helium had been led
Turan was conducted toward the throne room of O-Tar the jeddak, and when he
entered the Hall of Chiefs his interest turned to wonder and admiration as he
viewed the ranks of statuesque thoatmen decked in their gorgeous, martial
panoply. Never, he thought, had he seen upon Barsoom more soldierly figures or
thoats so perfectly trained to perfection of immobility as these. Not a muscle
quivered, not a tail lashed, and the riders were as motionless as their mounts--
each warlike eye straight to the front, the great spears inclined at the same angle.
It was a picture to fill the breast of a fighting man with awe and reverence. Nor
did it fail in its effect upon Turan as they conducted him the length of the
chamber, where he waited before great doors until he should be summoned into
the presence of the ruler of Manator.
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