SOME TIME after Grandon and Vernia separated at the mouth of the cave to look for their riding-beasts which had disappeared, and which they believed had strayed in search of food, there came faintly to the ears of the Earth-man a sound that caused him to stop, whirl around, and listen intently. So slight was the sound that he could not quite make it out, yet it had a quality which made him suspicious that Vernia had called him. Though he strained his ears to catch a possible repetition, none was audible.
Alarmed, he retraced his steps as swiftly as possible, but the soft, newly fallen snow retarded his progress considerably. Fuming impatiently at the delay, he floundered past the mouth of the cave in which they had passed the night, and anxiously took up Vernia’s trail, shouting her name as he went. But there was no reply.
The tracks led him close to the irregular base of the cliff, and as Grandon stumbled around a bend, he saw the same sight which Vernia had beheld only a short time before, and which had led to her entrapment—a bristly white and green object curving outward from behind a projection, which looked like a segment of Zorovian cactus. Like her, he thought it part of some antarctic plant, and proceeded incautiously toward it. He came to a sudden pause, however, and presented the spiral point of his lance, as the apparent segment resolved itself into one of the chelae of an immense white scorpion, which shot out from behind the projection, and charged swiftly toward him.
Pointing his lance, Grandon pulled back the lever which set the spiral head to whirling. Fearlessly, and without swerving or endeavoring to evade the weapon, the monster sprang at the Earth-man with its immense pincers extended to seize him. Right in the thorax the lance point struck, and bored in up to the knob. Grandon was thrown backward by the impact of that charge, but by diverting the butt of his lance downward and plunging it through the snow until it struck frozen ground beneath, was able to hold the scorpion away from him.
Then still clinging to the shaft with his left hand, he drew his scarbo with his right, and struck at the nearest chela. It was quite tough and horny, and the blade did not bite more than half-way through it. Clenching his teeth, he struck again with all his strength, and this time succeeded in severing it near the middle. Having mastered the art of it, he was able to cut off the other claw at the first joint with two sharp blows.
But no sooner had these menaces been removed than he was threatened with another, even more dangerous. With lightning swiftness, the monster suddenly elevated its long, jointed tail, and stabbed at him with the terrible telson with which the tip was armed.
Avoiding the deadly thrust of the poison sting by leaning sideways, Grandon hacked at the thing with his scarbo. To his surprise, it was quite brittle, and broke off with the first blow.
Although the monster was now unable to injure him except at very close quarters, it was not without resource. It suddenly reached beneath its abdomen with its foremost pair of hairy legs, and drawing therefrom a section of gleaming, sticky web as thick as a rope, it cast the loop about him and dragged him forward. He clung to the lance shaft with all his might, and succeeded in severing the sticky loop with a stroke of his scarbo. Not so a second loop, however, which it unexpectedly flung around him, breaking his hold on the shaft, as it jerked him toward its ugly gaping mandibles with his right arm bound to his side.
He had previously refrained from using his tork for fear the sound would bring enemies but in this extremity he elevated the muzzle, depressed the firing-button, and sent a stream of bullets straight into the gaping jaws. With muffled detonations the projectiles exploded in the huge, armored body. A half dozen of them sufficed to blow the hardshelled cephalothorax to bits, and reduced the segmented abdomen to a shapeless quivering mass.
Quickly shifting his scarbo to his left hand, Grandon cut himself free of the sticky loop that encumbered him. Then, perceiving the yawning cave mouth, and suspecting that it was here that Vernia had been taken, he rushed inside. Despite their wrappings, he was able to identify the two zandars, one hanging in the center of the huge web, the other at the edge beside a large spherical cocoon. But what was the smaller object beside the cocoon? His heart stood still as he recognized the slender form of Vernia, and saw that a young scorpion, which had evidently just emerged from the cocoon, was crawling toward her.
Although the newly hatched monster was not more than six feet from Vernia, and he could not shoot without endangering her, he knew that there was nothing else to do. Accordingly, he brought his tork to bear on the hairy youngster, and fired. There was a muffled explosion, and the menace was removed. But now he saw another pair of chelae emerging from the cocoon. Again he fired, and the second young scorpion was blown to bits. He watched for a moment, but as no more appeared, decided that the other eggs had not yet hatched, and set about trying to find a way to climb to where Vernia was suspended.
The stickiness of the web made this almost impossible, until he thought to utilize the dust and debris which littered the door. Catching this up in double handfuls, he flung it against the section of the web which he wished to climb, and found, as he hoped, that it prevented the adhesive surface of the strands from clinging to his hands and feet.
Swiftly he climbed up to Vernia, cut the surrounding strands, and as swiftly descended to the floor with his burden. With his knife he quickly slit open the wrappings and found his wife, limp, and apparently lifeless. He opened her great fur cloak, and the sight of several scratches on her white skin engendered the fear that she had been poisoned by the venom of the monster. But when he held his ear to her breast, he was relieved to hear her heart beating.
With a handful of snow taken from the cave mouth, be touched her temples. The cold shock revived her. She looked about wildly for a moment; then, recognizing Grandon, she relaxed contentedly in his arms.
“Are you hurt, dear?” he asked.
“Only a few scratches, Bob,” she replied. “It was the fright that made me swoon. When I saw that young strid coming toward me, as I hung there helpless, and realized that its purpose was to devour me, I fainted. Let me rest for a little while, and I’ll be ready to walk.”
“Perhaps you won’t need to walk,” said Grandon. “One zandar appears to be alive. I’ll see if I can cut it down.”
Utilizing the dust as he had done before, Grandon succeeded in making a path up the web for himself to where the zandar hung beside the immense cocoon. With his scarbo, he first cut the heavy, rope-like strands above it. Then, as the great bulk of the beast swung downward, he cut the cross strands in succession, and with each cut, the zandar descended a little farther. When at last the beast was on the floor, it was still helpless because of the thorough manner in which it had been trussed: But its heaving flanks showed that it was still very much alive, and not a little frightened by the experience it had just gone through. Employing his knife, Grandon quickly cut the strands which held it, and it struggled to its feet, trembling and panting heavily.
“It seems unhurt,” said Vernia, who had recovered from her faintness and come over to watch the proceedings.
“Its legs are sound, at any rate,” replied Grandon.
The beast followed them docilely enough through the mouth of the cave. Then, after helping Vernia into the saddle Grandon returned for a moment, to apply his flame maker to the bottom of the web. It caught fire with a roar, and he plunged out of the cave followed by a billowing cloud of black, oily smoke.
“That will do for the rest of the ugly brood,” he said as he came up beside Vernia.
He was about to mount behind her, when he suddenly saw, riding swiftly toward them, a large band of warriors mounted on zandars. They were not Ibbits, as he could see at a glance, but Huitsenni, and had evidently heard his tork fire and come to investigate. Instantly the riders deployed in a wide semicircle, cutting off all possibility of escape across the snow. As they could not climb the sheer face of the cliff behind them, nor retire into the cave, which was now belching great clouds of acrid smoke, they remained where they were, Vernia still in the saddle, and Grandon beside her.
Had he been alone, Grandon would have resisted desperately, but he knew that if he should use his tork the enemy would retaliate in kind, and Vernia might be injured or slain. A moment more, and he was looking into the mouths of fully a hundred torks leveled at him by a closely packed semicircle of riders. Then the mojak in command ordered a halt, and called out to Grandon: “Surrender, in the name of the Rogo of Huitsen, or we fire.”
Seeing that resistance was useless, Grandon unbuckled the belt which contained his weapons, and flung it on the snow in front of him. Then he clasped his hands behind his head in token of surrender.
At the order of the mojak, two men descended and swiftly bound him, hand and foot. Then he was slung across the saddle-bow of one of the riders as if he had been a sack of grain, and the cavalcade rode away. Vernia was not bound, but was permitted to retain her place in the saddle with a guard on each side of her.
Several hours later, it seemed to Grandon that all of Huitsen had turned out to stare at the two prisoners that their riders were bringing in, so dense were the crowds along the streets. Their captors took them straight to the palace, where they were deprived of their Ibbit furs, which were not needed here in the warm lowlands. Then the mojak, quite obviously proud of his success, led them to the throne room, each guarded by two of his warriors.
Up to the time they were ushered into that vast room, Grandon had entertained the hope that one of the Chispoks had succeeded Yin Yin, but his hopes were dashed as he recognized the individual who squatted in the center of the crystal throne. It was the bestial Thid Yet, former Romojak of the Navies of Huitsen. Like his predecessor, he was surrounded by numerous attendants and nobles, and his gross body was loaded with flashing jewels. The porcine monarch grinned toothlessly as they were brought before him.
“It is apparent that our men have persuaded Your Majesties to avail yourselves once more of our cordial if humble hospitality,” he said. “We are honored.”
“Your Majesty’s warriors have persuasive ways,” replied Grandon. “Perhaps, now that you are Rogo, we can persuade you to permit us to depart to our own torrogat, where duty calls us.”
“Perhaps,” replied Thid Yet, dipping his thumb into a spore pod which one of the former slave girls of Yin Yin presented and thrusting the red spores into his fat cheek. “Just what is your proposition?”
“Say, a million keds of gold.”
“Humph! We are offered more for Her Majesty alone.”
“Two million.”
“Not enough.”
“Three—”
“Wait,” interrupted Thid Yet. “You but waste your breath. Her Majesty will remain here as was previously arranged, until it is time to take her to the rendezvous. Though she has been deprived of the pleasure of Yin Yin’s company, we trust that we will make a satisfactory substitute.”
“Why you—!” Grandon would have sprung at the throat of the man on the throne had he not been seized by the guards.
“One moment, Majesty. Permit me to finish. We are grieved that we can not entirely comply with your request, yet we will in part fulfill it.”
“In part?”
“Yes. We will permit you to leave, but not for your own country. Although you left no witnesses we have considerable evidence that it was you who beheaded our just and generous predecessor. We also remember that it was due to you that we nearly lost our own head. So we will allow you to leave—will, in fact, speed you on your way, for it would be dangerous to have you near us. But instead of sending you to your own torrogat, we will dispatch you to the Kingdom of Thorth.”
Thorth being the Kingdom of Heaven, he beckoned to one of the two brawny guards who stood behind the throne—their immense two-handed scarbos much in evidence. “Come, Ez Bin. Clip me the head from this fine fellow, and see that you cut it cleanly, as I would retain it for a souvenir.”
Swinging the heavy scarbo to his shoulder, the headsman marched forward. Grandon was quickly forced to his knees by his two guards. Ez Bin took a position beside him, tested the keenness of his blade with his thumb, and carefully measured the distance and position of Grandon’s neck, closing one eye and squinting the other. Then, with the swift assurance of an expert, he raised his blade.
Vernia, who had been watching the scene, too horrified even to utter a sound, covered her eyes with her hands. Then she suddenly went limp in the hands of her two guards.