www.freeclassicebooks.com

CHAPTER IX - ADRIFT OVER STRANGE REGIONS

Presently Ghek pushed aside a door that opened from the stairway, and before

them Tara saw the moonlight flooding the walled court where the headless rykors

lay beside their feeding-troughs. She saw the perfect bodies, muscled as the best

of her father's fighting men, and the females whose figures would have been the

envy of many of Helium's most beautiful women. Ah, if she could but endow these

with the power to act! Then indeed might the safety of the panthan be assured;

but they were only poor lumps of clay, nor had she the power to quicken them to

life. Ever must they lie thus until dominated by the cold, heartless brain of the

kaldane. The girl sighed in pity even as she shuddered in disgust as she picked

her way over and among the sprawled creatures toward the flier.

Quickly she and Ghek mounted to the deck after the latter had cast off the

moorings. Tara tested the control, raising and lowering the ship a few feet within

the walled space. It responded perfectly. Then she lowered it to the ground again

and waited. From the open doorway came the sounds of conflict, now nearing

them, now receding. The girl, having witnessed her champion's skill, had little

fear of the outcome. Only a single antagonist could face him at a time upon the

narrow stairway, he had the advantage of position and of the defensive, and he

was a master of the sword while they were clumsy bunglers by comparison. Their

sole advantage was in their numbers, unless they might find a way to come upon

him from behind.

She paled at the thought. Could she have seen him she might have been further

perturbed, for he took no advantage of many opportunities to win nearer the

enclosure. He fought coolly, but with a savage persistence that bore little

semblance to purely defensive action. Often he clambered over the body of a

fallen foe to leap against the next behind, and once there lay five dead kaldanes

behind him, so far had he pushed back his antagonists. They did not know it;

these kaldanes that he fought, nor did the girl awaiting him upon the flier, but

Gahan of Gathol was engaged in a more alluring sport than winning to freedom,

for he was avenging the indignities that had been put upon the woman he loved;

but presently he realized that he might be jeopardizing her safety uselessly, and

so he struck down another before him and turning leaped quickly up the

stairway, while the leading kaldanes slipped upon the brain-covered floor and

stumbled in pursuit.

Gahan reached the enclosure twenty paces ahead of them and raced toward the

flier. "Rise!" he shouted to the girl. "I will ascend the cable."

The Chessmen of Mars