Chained In Warhoon

: A Princess Of Mars

It must have been several hours before I regained consciousness and I

well remember the feeling of surprise which swept over me as I realized

that I was not dead.



I was lying among a pile of sleeping silks and furs in the corner of a

small room in which were several green warriors, and bending over me

was an ancient and ugly female.



As I opened my eyes she turned to one of the warriors, sayi g,



"He will live, O Jed."



"'Tis well," replied the one so addressed, rising and approaching my

couch, "he should render rare sport for the great games."



And now as my eyes fell upon him, I saw that he was no Thark, for his

ornaments and metal were not of that horde. He was a huge fellow,

terribly scarred about the face and chest, and with one broken tusk and

a missing ear. Strapped on either breast were human skulls and

depending from these a number of dried human hands.



His reference to the great games of which I had heard so much while

among the Tharks convinced me that I had but jumped from purgatory into

gehenna.



After a few more words with the female, during which she assured him

that I was now fully fit to travel, the jed ordered that we mount and

ride after the main column.



I was strapped securely to as wild and unmanageable a thoat as I had

ever seen, and, with a mounted warrior on either side to prevent the

beast from bolting, we rode forth at a furious pace in pursuit of the

column. My wounds gave me but little pain, so wonderfully and rapidly

had the applications and injections of the female exercised their

therapeutic powers, and so deftly had she bound and plastered the

injuries.



Just before dark we reached the main body of troops shortly after they

had made camp for the night. I was immediately taken before the

leader, who proved to be the jeddak of the hordes of Warhoon.



Like the jed who had brought me, he was frightfully scarred, and also

decorated with the breastplate of human skulls and dried dead hands

which seemed to mark all the greater warriors among the Warhoons, as

well as to indicate their awful ferocity, which greatly transcends even

that of the Tharks.



The jeddak, Bar Comas, who was comparatively young, was the object of

the fierce and jealous hatred of his old lieutenant, Dak Kova, the jed

who had captured me, and I could not but note the almost studied

efforts which the latter made to affront his superior.



He entirely omitted the usual formal salutation as we entered the

presence of the jeddak, and as he pushed me roughly before the ruler he

exclaimed in a loud and menacing voice.



"I have brought a strange creature wearing the metal of a Thark whom it

is my pleasure to have battle with a wild thoat at the great games."



"He will die as Bar Comas, your jeddak, sees fit, if at all," replied

the young ruler, with emphasis and dignity.



"If at all?" roared Dak Kova. "By the dead hands at my throat but he

shall die, Bar Comas. No maudlin weakness on your part shall save him.

O, would that Warhoon were ruled by a real jeddak rather than by a

water-hearted weakling from whom even old Dak Kova could tear the metal

with his bare hands!"



Bar Comas eyed the defiant and insubordinate chieftain for an instant,

his expression one of haughty, fearless contempt and hate, and then

without drawing a weapon and without uttering a word he hurled himself

at the throat of his defamer.



I never before had seen two green Martian warriors battle with nature's

weapons and the exhibition of animal ferocity which ensued was as

fearful a thing as the most disordered imagination could picture. They

tore at each others' eyes and ears with their hands and with their

gleaming tusks repeatedly slashed and gored until both were cut fairly

to ribbons from head to foot.



Bar Comas had much the better of the battle as he was stronger, quicker

and more intelligent. It soon seemed that the encounter was done

saving only the final death thrust when Bar Comas slipped in breaking

away from a clinch. It was the one little opening that Dak Kova

needed, and hurling himself at the body of his adversary he buried his

single mighty tusk in Bar Comas' groin and with a last powerful effort

ripped the young jeddak wide open the full length of his body, the

great tusk finally wedging in the bones of Bar Comas' jaw. Victor and

vanquished rolled limp and lifeless upon the moss, a huge mass of torn

and bloody flesh.



Bar Comas was stone dead, and only the most herculean efforts on the

part of Dak Kova's females saved him from the fate he deserved. Three

days later he walked without assistance to the body of Bar Comas which,

by custom, had not been moved from where it fell, and placing his foot

upon the neck of his erstwhile ruler he assumed the title of Jeddak of

Warhoon.



The dead jeddak's hands and head were removed to be added to the

ornaments of his conqueror, and then his women cremated what remained,

amid wild and terrible laughter.



The injuries to Dak Kova had delayed the march so greatly that it was

decided to give up the expedition, which was a raid upon a small Thark

community in retaliation for the destruction of the incubator, until

after the great games, and the entire body of warriors, ten thousand in

number, turned back toward Warhoon.



My introduction to these cruel and bloodthirsty people was but an index

to the scenes I witnessed almost daily while with them. They are a

smaller horde than the Tharks but much more ferocious. Not a day

passed but that some members of the various Warhoon communities met in

deadly combat. I have seen as high as eight mortal duels within a

single day.



We reached the city of Warhoon after some three days march and I was

immediately cast into a dungeon and heavily chained to the floor and

walls. Food was brought me at intervals but owing to the utter

darkness of the place I do not know whether I lay there days, or weeks,

or months. It was the most horrible experience of all my life and that

my mind did not give way to the terrors of that inky blackness has been

a wonder to me ever since. The place was filled with creeping,

crawling things; cold, sinuous bodies passed over me when I lay down,

and in the darkness I occasionally caught glimpses of gleaming, fiery

eyes, fixed in horrible intentness upon me. No sound reached me from

the world above and no word would my jailer vouchsafe when my food was

brought to me, although I at first bombarded him with questions.



Finally all the hatred and maniacal loathing for these awful creatures

who had placed me in this horrible place was centered by my tottering

reason upon this single emissary who represented to me the entire horde

of Warhoons.



I had noticed that he always advanced with his dim torch to where he

could place the food within my reach and as he stooped to place it upon

the floor his head was about on a level with my breast. So, with the

cunning of a madman, I backed into the far corner of my cell when next

I heard him approaching and gathering a little slack of the great chain

which held me in my hand I waited his coming, crouching like some beast

of prey. As he stooped to place my food upon the ground I swung the

chain above my head and crashed the links with all my strength upon his

skull. Without a sound he slipped to the floor, stone dead.



Laughing and chattering like the idiot I was fast becoming I fell upon

his prostrate form my fingers feeling for his dead throat. Presently

they came in contact with a small chain at the end of which dangled a

number of keys. The touch of my fingers on these keys brought back my

reason with the suddenness of thought. No longer was I a jibbering

idiot, but a sane, reasoning man with the means of escape within my

very hands.



As I was groping to remove the chain from about my victim's neck I

glanced up into the darkness to see six pairs of gleaming eyes fixed,

unwinking, upon me. Slowly they approached and slowly I shrank back

from the awful horror of them. Back into my corner I crouched holding

my hands palms out, before me, and stealthily on came the awful eyes

until they reached the dead body at my feet. Then slowly they

retreated but this time with a strange grating sound and finally they

disappeared in some black and distant recess of my dungeon.