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

insisted that I make her a bow, arrows and quiver. After I had cut a number of reeds into the correct length for arrows I set her to feathering the shafts with bits of fern leaf while I manufactured a number of crude sharp flint slivers for the heads.

      After I had a sufficient quantity of these rough tips made, I showed her how to bind them to the shafts, while I scraped, dried, and rubbed with hot fat a section of frella hide for the quiver. While it was hanging by the fire I made a bow.

      This work occupied several hours, during which time the kroger slept contentedly beside the princess. When everything was completed and we were ready to resume our journey, the hideous baby reptile promptly woke up and followed us.

      As we did not care to run the risk of another attack by the slimy swamp dwellers we planned to follow the mountain range which gradually curved toward the southeast, thus avoiding the marsh and eventually coming out on the coast of the Ropok Ocean. Here we might meet the rescue party of Prince Gadrimel, or failing in this, could try to follow the coast northward to Adonijar.

      After about five hours of travel, during which time the princess had been practicing with her new weapons and keeping me busy retrieving arrows, we decided to stop in a small clump of water ferns for food and rest. I had just unslung the haunch of frella meat which I carried and hung it on a fern frond so the young kroger couldn’t get it, preparatory to building a fire, when I heard a terrific roar come from over the brow of the hill, followed by the shouting of men, the crashing of underbrush, and intermittent snarls and growls.

      I hurried to the hilltop to investigate, the princess running after me and the kroger waddling behind her as fast as its short legs would carry it.

      Taking cover behind the bushy fronds of a cycad, I peered down at the scene of strife below. A party of men, about fifty in number, was engaged in a battle with an enormous ramph. The huge, hairless, bear-like creature reared up on its hind feet from time to time, towering above the men around it like a giant among pygmies.

      Half a dozen of the men already lay motionless on the ground, yet the others, swarming about the fierce beast, seemed absolutely fearless. They were armed with knives and long, straight-bladed, two-edged swords, and were naked except for their sword-belts, which appeared to be of metal links, and their gleaming, conical helmets or casques.

      They were a white-skinned race—too white, I thought, as if they spent nearly all their time indoors. And they wore no beards—an unusual thing on Zarovia, where a beard, cut off square below the chin, was a mark of fashionable manhood.

      As I watched, a man darted in to deliver a thrust with his sword. Before he could do so the ramph whipped out with a huge paw and stretched him, crushed and still, on the ground a full twenty feet away. Another man who succeeded in pricking the creature beneath the right shoulder met a like fate.

      Instinctively I reached for bow and arrow, but remembered that at that range an arrow could not possibly do more than add to the fury of the beast. Then a scheme came to my mind which I instantly put into execution. Removing an ammunition clip marked Tork Projectiles, Deadly, from the belt I had taken from Taliboz, I extracted one of the needlelike missiles and with a bit of cord, bound it to the head of my arrow.

      After replacing the clip in my belt, I took careful aim and released the shaft. It struck the ramph in the shoulder and the deadly virus acted almost instantly; in a few seconds it keeled over, to fight no more.

      Apparently mystified at what had killed the great beast, the men clustered curiously about the fallen brute, examining it intently. One pulled the arrow from its shoulder and was instantly surrounded by a group of his comrades, all eager to see and handle it.

      “Shall we make ourselves known to them?” I asked the princess, who was peering over my shoulder.

      “As you will,” she replied. “They seem to be soldiers of a civilized nation, but one I do not recognize. No doubt they will be glad to help us when they know who we are.”

      I stepped from behind the cycad and shouted the universal Zarovian word for peace—“Dua!”

      The entire armed band whirled toward me, and I was horrified at the unhuman quality of their gaze—as if they were more, or less, than men.

      Chapter 10

       Table of Contents

      The leader of the hunters called out “Dua” and Princess Loralie stepped from her hiding place to my side. Together we walked toward them.

      “I am Pangar,” said their leader, according us the royal salute in deference to the scarlet we wore. He himself, although not clothed, had a purple band on his metallic helmet and touches of purple on his accouterments which marked him as a member of the nobility.

      “I am Zinlo of Olba,” I replied, acknowledging his salute, “and this is the Torrogina Loralie of Tyrhana.”

      “In the name of my royal master, Tandor of Doravia, I bid Your Highness welcome,” he said. “Will you accompany me to the palace and permit my emperor the pleasure of greeting you in person?”

      “We’ll be delighted.”

      “Your indulgence for a moment, then, while I see if any of my men can be salvaged.”

      “Salvaged!” I was struck by the peculiarity of the term when applied to men. It brought home to me that there was something extremely odd about these people. The motions of many of them seemed to be quite stiff and awkward —mechanical, that was it—like the motions of marionettes.

      Their armor, accouterments and weapons, too, were not made of ordinary metal, as I had first thought, but were constructed from a material which greatly resembled glass. The blades of the swords and daggers were quite transparent. The hilts resembled colored glass.

      The helmets were also transparent, except for the colored band at the base of each denoting the status of the wearer. The chain belts and shoulder straps were of the same material, but lined with ramph leather, evidently to prevent their contact with the body.

      Pangar bent over one of the fallen men. “Think you can make it?” he asked.

      The stricken one spoke weakly. “Power unit is low. Was shorted for a time, but I have it back in place now. If someone can spare some power…”

      “Who can spare power?” asked Pangar.

      A man stepped up. “I can spare five xads.”

      “Good.” From a hook on his belt, Pangar took two coiled tubes that resembled insulated wires with metal sockets at each end. He inserted an end of each wire in each ear of the fallen man and handed the other two ends to the man standing. The latter instantly inserted an end in each ear, meanwhile watching an indicator which was strapped to his wrist. Presently he jerked a tube from one ear, then the other. The fallen man arose, apparently restored to strength, and returned the wires to Pangar.

      I noticed the next man. His entire breast had been torn away by the claws of the ramph. There was a set expression on his features, as of death or deep hypnotic sleep. But around the jagged wound was no sign of blood. The flesh, if it was flesh, was a peculiar grayish-red shade. And where the viscera would have been exposed in a normal human being, I saw a conglomeration of coils, tubes, wheels and wires, tangled and broken.

      Pangar passed him by with but a single glance. “No use to try to save this one.”

      He rapidly examined the other fallen men. Two were picked up and slung over the shoulders of comrades. The rest were stripped of their weapons and helmets and left lying on the ground. A half dozen men, using their keen knives, had already skinned the ramph. It seemed that they wanted the hide only, not the flesh, for the great red carcass was left lying near the broken figures of the fallen men when we went.

      Men or machines—which? I pondered the matter as Loralie and I walked beside the courteous and seemingly human Pangar, while the kroger waddled at our heels.

      After