The Lost World MEGAPACK®. Lin Carter

      “The United States of America,” I declared.

      His brows wrinkled at the name.

      “The Un-ited States-es…your land must be far away, for never have I heard of it!” he remarked.

      “It is very far away, indeed,” I admitted.

      And, in all truth, I did not lie. For my homeland lay on the other side of the planet, and a hundred miles (at least) straight up.

      He looked me over again with frank curiosity, and I took the opportunity to check him out, as well. He was a magnificent figure of a man, with a physique like a wrestler, tall and well-formed, and straight as a sword blade. A man past his first youth, obviously, but in the full and glorious prime of his life.

      His features were regular, even handsome in a strong, commanding way, with eagle-sharp blue eyes, a lofty brow and a strong, good jaw framed in thick yellow hair and a thick curly, beard, like a Viking chief. Heavy blond mustaches swept back to either side of his mouth, and his head was crowned with a peculiar headdress whose chief ornaments were two curved ivory fangs from the jaws of just such a giant saber-tooth as lay dead at our feet.

      His magnificent torso was bare, save for ornaments, and splendidly developed. Here and there the scars of ancient wounds marred the clear, tanned flesh. A triple necklace of the fangs of beasts encircled his strong throat. Bands of worked bronze clasped him at biceps and muscular wrist. All he wore for clothing was a brief loincloth of dappled fur, but his feet were clad in high-laced buskins of tanned leather. At his waist he bore a bronze dagger sheathed in reptile skin. His mien was imperious, commanding. At once I knew him for a king.

      I have met a couple of kings in my time. Once you have met one, you can recognize another at a glance.

      They have a look to them, something about the eyes and something in the set of the shoulders that is unmistakable.

      They have the look of eagles.

      And this man was the most impressive and majestic figure I have ever encountered.

      He was examining me with as much interest as I was examining him. I could tell from the way his fine brow crinkled that he had never before seen a man with black, curly hair and clear gray eyes. I believe I have already mentioned that the Neanderthals all had either red or brown hair, and that the Cro-Magnons were uniformly blond and blue-eyed. If any other peoples shared the jungle world of Zanthodon with these two races, I had yet to encounter them and had no idea as to their coloration; I believed myself to be unique in this Underground World.

      His keen eyes upon my curly black hair, this primeval monarch addressed me with yet another question.

      “Are you from the country of Zar, perchance, or from the land of the Men-Who-Ride-Upon-Water?”

      I shook my head.

      “I have never heard of Zar,” I said firmly, “and have no idea where it is. And I do not even know what you mean by ‘the Men-Who-Ride-Upon-Water.’”

      Baffled, he shrugged slightly, giving up the mystery. Then, squaring his magnificent shoulders, he said:

      “I am Tharn, Omad of Thandar, a country farther down the coast,” he declared in a ringing voice.

      And at those glad words my heart leaped with thankfulness.

      “If you are truly Tharn of Thandar,” I said, a trifle unsteadily, “then I have good news for you. For your daughter, Darya the gomad, is alive and safe and somewhere in these very jungles!”

      I have never seen such an expression of heart-breaking relief and joy flare in the eyes of any man as I saw then and there in the eyes of Darya’s mighty sire.

      CHAPTER 15

      THRONE OF SKULLS

      One-Eye guided the dugout canoe around the rocky coasts of the island of Ganadol, finally indicating with a blow the point at which he desired his captive to beach their craft.

      It was the mouth of a narrow lagoon which gave forth on a bleak and unpromising prospect of sandy, rock-strewn waste, ringed about with crumbling cliffs of sandstone whose sheer walls were cleft by numerous openings, the mouths of caves.

      Obediently, Fumio rowed the canoe to the beach, then climbed ashore and dragged the canoe farther up the tawny sands with the help of One-Eye’s great strength.

      Two Drugar, stationed atop great flat-topped boulders above the beach, obviously as sentinels, watched silently, leaning upon long stone-bladed spears.

      “Ho, One-Eye!” one of them grunted. “You depart with more than a hand of warriors, and return alone, with but one panjan for captive! Has strength deserted your arms and courage deserted your bowels?”

      The other guard guffawed at this coarse jest. One-Eye’s face darkened furiously. He growled and spat, measuring the other with a furious eye.

      “But come within my reach, Gomak,” he snarled, “and you shall learn if strength has deserted the arms of One-Eye!”

      The sentinel uttered a sneering laugh, but Fumio noticed that he stayed where he was and did not accept One-Eye’s invitation.

      Turning to the second sentinel, One-Eye demanded of him the whereabouts of one Uruk.

      The sentinel shrugged. “The Omad speaks with Xask the Wise at this time,” he grunted. “It is not good to disturb chiefs at their councils,” he warned.

      One-Eye grinned and strutted.

      “Borag may warn, but One-Eye knows not the taste of fear,” he declared, boastfully. “And One-Eye returns to Kor with word that will please the ear of Uruk the High Chief, aye, and the ears of Xask as well!”

      The guard shrugged, gesturing. Seizing hold of Fumio’s long hair, One-Eye strode up the beach and entered the largest of the caves.

      As darkness closed about the Thandarian, courage deserted his heart—what little was left therein at this point, at any rate.

      * * * *

      Within the cave-mouth you ventured down a long stonewalled, narrow way which opened out suddenly into an immense open space, as round as a rotunda, with a domed roof which lifted far above.

      Therefrom, suspended like monstrous stony icicles, hung long stalactites. The domed cavern was lit by the smoky flaring of many tar-soaked torches.

      Against the farther wall, which was pierced by two natural openings, both hung with hide-curtains, a jutting shelf of rock formed a natural dais. And upon this stone step stood the throne of Uruk, High Chief of the Drugars and King of Kor.

      It was a throne of skulls!

      Grinning death-heads, their polished ivory rondures agleam in the smoky torchlight, had been fastened together with molten lead to form a monstrous chair. They were the skulls, Fumio observed with a sinking heart, of true men such as himself: of men, women and even children, were the skulls, which boded ill for his future existence in this grim kingdom.

      Atop this ghastly throne there squatted the most hideous figure Fumio had ever dreamed to exist.

      Uruk was seven and a half feet tall, a veritable giant. And his corpulence was such that he weighed twice as much even as the tall and formidable Thandarian himself. His obese paunch was hairy and repulsive; his sloping shoulders and long, dangling, gorilla-like arms were thickly furred. About his thick wrists were clasped gold bangles and ivory bracelets from distant Zar, ornaments of bronze and copper thieved from Thandar, and amulets of paste and carven stone.

      These did little to relieve the pall of his hideousness.

      His face was a thing from the blackest pit of nightmares into which any dreaming soul has ever floundred, shrieking. The tip of an aurochs’ horn had long ago ripped his face in half, drawing up one corner of his blubbery lips into a grimace of a frozen smile. Long tusks and broken fangs hung over his sagging lips, and his face was covered with a grisly network of scar tissue.

      His