Free The Chessmen of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs Page A

with the white,
tile-like material with which the interior of the light wall was
faced. Close to the base of the walls were numerous smaller
apertures, circular in shape, but larger than those of similar
aspect that she had noted elsewhere. The majority of these
apertures were sealed. Directly opposite the entrance was one
framed in gold, and above it a peculiar device was inlaid in the
same precious metal.
    Sept and Ghek halted just within the room, the girl between them,
and all three stood silently facing the opening in the opposite
wall. On the floor beside the aperture lay a headless male body
of almost heroic proportions, and on either side of this stood a
heavily armed warrior, with drawn sword. For perhaps five minutes
the three waited and then something appeared in the opening. It
was a pair of large chelae and immediately thereafter there
crawled forth a hideous kaldane of enormous proportions. He was
half again as large as any that Tara of Helium had yet seen and
his whole aspect infinitely more terrible. The skin of the others
was a bluish gray—this one was of a little bluer tinge and the
eyes were ringed with bands of white and scarlet, as was its
mouth.
    From each nostril a band of white and one of scarlet extended
outward horizontally the width of the face.
    No one spoke or moved. The creature crawled to the prostrate body
and affixed itself to the neck. Then the two rose as one and
approached the girl. He looked at her and then he spoke to her
captor.
    "You are the third foreman of the fields of Luud?" he asked.
    "Yes, Luud; I am called Ghek."
    "Tell me what you know of this," and he nodded toward Tara of
Helium.
    Ghek did as he was bid and then Luud addressed the girl.
    "What were you doing within the borders of Bantoom?" he asked.
    "I was blown hither in a great storm that injured my flier and
carried me I knew not where. I came down into the valley at night
for food and drink. The banths came and drove me to the safety of
a tree, and then your people caught me as I was trying to leave
the valley. I do not know why they took me. I was doing no harm.
All I ask is that you let me go my way in peace."
    "None who enters Bantoom ever leaves," replied Luud.
    "But my people are not at war with yours. I am a princess of
Helium; my great-grandfather is a jeddak; my grandfather a jed;
and my father is Warlord of all Barsoom. You have no right to
keep me and I demand that you liberate me at once."
    "None who enters Bantoom ever leaves," repeated the creature
without expression. "I know nothing of the lesser creatures of
Barsoom, of whom you speak. There is but one high race—the race
of Bantoomians. All Nature exists to serve them. You shall do
your share, but not yet—you are too skinny. We shall have to put
some fat upon it, Sept. I tire of rykor. Perhaps this will have a
different flavor. The banths are too rank and it is seldom that
any other creature enters the valley. And you, Ghek; you shall be
rewarded. I shall promote you from the fields to the burrows.
Hereafter you shall remain underground as every Bantoomian longs
to. No more shall you be forced to endure the hated sun, or look
upon the hideous sky, or the hateful growing things that defile
the surface. For the present you shall look after this thing that
you have brought me, seeing that it sleeps and eats—and does
nothing else. You understand me, Ghek; nothing else!"
    "I understand, Luud," replied the other.
    "Take it away!" commanded the creature.
    Ghek turned and led Tara of Helium from the apartment. The girl
was horrified by contemplation of the fate that awaited her—a
fate from which it seemed, there was no escape. It was only too
evident that these creatures possessed no gentle or chivalric
sentiments to which she could appeal, and that she might escape
from the labyrinthine mazes of their underground burrows appeared
impossible.
    Outside the audience chamber Sept overtook them and conversed
with Ghek for a brief period, then her keeper led