Free 3 - Barbarians of Mars by Edward P. Bradbury Page A

the ship but, lucidly, it
was drifting in my direction.
                   Soon I was being dragged on board and some of
the barbarians were hauling in the rope and the mast.
                   It was not long before Hool Haji was also
being helped aboard and we lay together, utterly weary, on the deck. Rokin,
seemingly just as weary, was leaning on a broken rail and looking down on us.
                   From somewhere a hot drink was brought to us
and we felt recovered enough to sit up and view the ship.
                   Virtually everything had been stripped from
the deck by the fury of the storm. Only the miraculous hull had survived,
relatively undamaged. Both masts had been ripped away, and 311 most of the
rails and all the deck furniture, including one of the hatch-covers, had been
swept overboard.
                   Rokin walked towards us.
                   "You were lucky," he said.
                   "And you," I replied. "Where
are we?"
                   "Somewhere on the
Western sea. Perhaps, judging by the direction of the
storm, closer to our own land than yours. We can only hope that the
currents are in our favour and that we shall soon reach land. Most of our
provisions were ruined when yonder hold filled." He pointed to the hold
that had had its cover ripped off. "The machines are down there, too -
also half immersed - but safe enough, I'd guess."
                   "They will never be safe - to you,"
I warned him.
                   He grinned. "Nothing can harm Rokin - not
even that storm."
                   "If I am right about the power of those
machines," I told him, "they threaten far more danger than the
storm."
                   "To Rokin's enemies, perhaps," retaliated the barbarian.
                   "To Rokin, too."
                   "What harm can they do to me? I have
them."
                   "I have warned you," I said, shaking
my head.
                   "What do you warn me about?"
                   "Your own
ignorance!" I said.
                   He shrugged. "One does not have to be so
full of knowledge to use such machines."
                   "Certainly," I agreed. "But one
needs knowledge to understand them. If you do not understand them, then you
will fear them soon enough."
                   "I do not follow your reasoning,
Bradhinak. You are boring me."
                   Once again I gave up trying to argue with the
barbarian, though I knew that in this case, as in all things, it is not enough'
to know that something works. One must also understand how it works before it
can be used to advantage, and used without personal danger.
                  

Chapter Eight
    THE CRYSTAL PIT
     
                   The ship reached land the next day - whether
the mainland of the Western continent or an island I did not then know.
                   We leaped from the ship into the shallows,
plunging thankfully up to the firm shore, while Rokin directed his men to beach
the hull.
                   When this was done and we sat in the shadow of
the hull, recovering from what we had endured in the past two days, Rokin
turned to me with a faint trace of his old grin.
                   "So now we are all far from home - and
far from our glory," he said.
                   "Thanks to you," said Hool Haji,
echoing my own sentiments.
                   "Well," said Rokin, fingering his
golden beard, now clogged with salt, "I suppose it is."
                   "Have you no idea where we are?" I
asked him.
                   "None."
                   "Then we had best strike off along the
coast in the hope of finding a friendly settlement," I suggested.
                   "I suppose so." He nodded. "But
someone