The Greatest Works of Otis Adelbert Kline - 18 Books in One Edition. Otis Adelbert Kline

new slave, eh?” he said gruffly. “Don’t stand there staring like a stupid ptang. You have eyes to see the nature of the task before you. Begin it quickly, before you have painful cause to regret your slowness.”

      Grandon cooly surveyed the great brute before him. His low forehead was crossed by a livid scar just above the beetling brows, from beneath which his small, beady eyes glared. His right ear had been completely torn away, and with it a portion of the surrounding scalp.

      “I have eyes to see and ears to hear that which pleases me not,” Grandon replied. “You accuse me of the stupidity of a ptang, but I must needs have the stupidity of a thousand ptangs to obey this thing miscalled a man which stands before me.”

      The overseer’s thick lips drew back; with lightninglike quickness he directed a blow at Grandon’s head. By ducking swiftly the Earthman avoided the full force of the blow which, glancing though it was, sent him reeling to the floor a full twenty feet away.

      “You would insult Od, would you?” the overseer snarled. “You would refuse to feed the fantas. Miserable, misbegotten offspring of misguided parents, then shall your torn body feed them, and that speedily.”

      He sprang and lifted his heavy foot for a kick; Grandon executed a quick scissors movement with his legs, and his assailant fell sprawling.

      Both men leaped to their feet in an instant. As they faced each other, the slaves abandoned their wriggling fanta charges and formed an excited ring about the pair. The giant Od was first annoyed, then amazed, at his inability to strike his opponent, while blows rained incessantly against his unguarded chin and solar plexus. At length, he abandoned all thought of striking his elusive antagonist and leaped forward to clutch him.

      It was the opening for which Grandon had been waiting. Stepping lightly to one side, he planted a terrific blow behind the ragged ear. Od reeled blindly for a moment then fell prone, where he lay limp and still.

      A shout of approval went up from the group of spectators; then a cry from a man near the door checked their cheering. “To your tasks, quickly! The sabits are coming!”

      They scattered, and when four soldier sabits arrived all but Grandon and Od were busily tending their fractious charges. The sabits spied Grandon, standing with heaving breast beside his prostrate foe, and ran quickly to where he stood. One of them looked inquiringly at him, and vibrated its antennae, producing a confusing series of tones. When it received no reply it brought a slave from near by and repeated the vibrations. The slave replied, using his voice to produce various tones, and Grandon judged from his gestures that he was describing the combat.

      Immediately one of the sabits made for the door, and shortly returned with the winged king. Then there was a further vibratory conversation, this time among the sabits. Grandon noticed that when they communicated with each other the vibrations were noiseless.

      Momentarily expecting to be punished, Grandon was amazed when the four soldier sabits suddenly leaped to the prostrate man and tore him to pieces. These pieces were distributed among the nearby grubs.

      Then the king sabit again vibrated his antennae, this time producing musical tones, and the slave translated for Grandon. “By order of the king sabit you are to assume immediately the duties of the man you just defeated; by vanquishing Od, greatest of all of us in the community, you have demonstrated your eligibility for the office.”

      “But I know nothing of these duties,” remonstrated Grandon.

      “It does not matter. The men know what is to be done. You are simply to maintain order and see that there is no idling. A soldier sabit will remain with you for a few days to teach you the tone language so that thereafter you may receive your orders direct from the sabits.”

      The working day of the sabits and their slaves began at dawn and continued until darkness. The slaves were fed twice daily, once upon rising and once when the day’s work was completed. The diet was always the same—a mixture of the sweet, sticky stuff and edible fungi.

      With the coming of darkness all members of the community were herded within the conical clay houses and the burrows which connected them. A sleeping room with bare dirt floors was set aside for the men and carefully guarded by soldier sabits. A separate dormitory for the women and children was similarly guarded. Men and women were not allowed to mingle during the day, and though they might see each other from a distance seldom had opportunities even for conversation.

      Grandon watched carefully for an opportunity to escape and return to Vernia, but it seemed that his every movement was anticipated by the watchful sabits. He learned the tone language readily, and after several weeks had elapsed, became fairly familiar with his surroundings and the mode of life of the strange creatures who had captured him. His instructor told him how the fantas were hatched from the eggs laid by the roga. They were tended and fed by women and girls until they reached a size that made it necessary for the men to take charge of them. When they had grown larger than adults, they were taken to a dark room deep under the ground, where they spun great, tough cocoons that completely surrounded them, and lay dormant in these, finally emerging as full- fledged adult sabits.

      Many days passed before Grandon was even permitted out of doors. Then, one morning, he was placed in charge of a crew of food carriers, and the white soldier sabits, taking their “cattle,” the green creatures, to their leafy pastures, led the way directly to the tree in which the airship was jammed.

      Grandon had mounted to gather the sweet torlage. After a tedious climb he saw the craft directly above him. Slaves, sabits and the green “cattle” swarmed all about it without paying it the slightest attention.

      Grandon moved cautiously toward the forked limb on which it rested, and peered within the cab. It was empty, and apparently open; he selected a knife and a small flashlight from the miscellaneous articles it contained, secreting them beneath his clothing.

      As there were no signs of a struggle he assumed that Vernia had left voluntarily; but he was equally certain that she could not have gone far without being captured and enslaved by the sabits.

      Having by this time become familiar with the fate of female slaves of marriageable age, Grandon resolved that she must be rescued speedily. There were hundreds of sabit communities in the valley, in any one of which she might be a prisoner; he must find a way to escape from his own community, then spy on all the others in turn until he found her.

      That night when the men had been quartered in their dormitory he thought of a plan, and set about at once to put it into execution.

      On the evening following her capture, Vernia was choking down a small portion of the sticky mess when she saw Rotha entering the women’s quarters.

      The girl ran toward her and buried her face in her bosom, weeping softly. Vernia noticed several bruises on her shoulders and arms, and the bluish prints of huge fingers on her neck.

      “Poor child,” Vernia murmured. “They have abused you shamefully.”

      The girl looked up into her eyes, and there was a smile on her quivering lips. “I weep not with sorrow, Vernia of Reabon,” she whispered. “It is because of my great joy that I cannot control myself. I tremble with rapture and thrill with the memory of a wonderful experience.”

      “But you have been choked and beaten.”

      “You do not understand. The man who made those marks is dead.”

      “Then you were rescued. Tell me of it.”

      “When I entered the mating pens, Oro, whom I love, met me at the gate and conducted me to the man for whom I had been destined by the king sabit. On the way I besought him to take me to an empty room and leave me there until tonight, but he said such tactics would be useless—that we would surely be found out and the sabits would put us both to death with horrible tortures.

      “When he led me into the room, a great, hairy man leaped up from the corner and seized me by the arms. I cried out and struggled to escape him. Oro had left, but he must have heard my cry, for I saw him enter the room just as the hairy giant hurled me to the floor.

      “Would