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09 - The God's of Mars - Edgar Rice Burroughs · Daily Classic Sci Fi Books

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  Speaker 1: Chapter ten, the prison isle of Shador. In the outer gardens,
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  Speaker 1: to which the guard now escorted me, I found Exodar
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  Speaker 1: surrounded by a crowd of noble blacks. They were reviling
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  Speaker 1: and cursing him. The men slapped his face, the woman
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  Speaker 1: spat upon him. When I appeared, they turned their attentions
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  Speaker 1: toward me. Ah, cried one, So this is the creature
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  Speaker 1: who overcame the great Exodar bare handed. Let us see
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  Speaker 1: how it was done. Let him bind, Third suggested, a
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  Speaker 1: beautiful woman laughing. Third is a noble detour. Let third
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  Speaker 1: show the dog what it means to face a real man. Yes, third,
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  Speaker 1: Third cried A dozen voices. Here he is now, exclaimed another, and,
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: turning in the direction, indicated, I saw a huge black,
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  Speaker 1: weighed down with resplendent ornaments and arms, advancing with noble
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  Speaker 1: and gallant bearing toward us. What now, he cried? What
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  Speaker 1: would you have? Thward? Quickly a dozen voices explain. Thward
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  Speaker 1: turned toward Exodar, his eyes narrowing to two nasty slits calot,
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  Speaker 1: he hissed, Ever, did I think you carried the heart
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  Speaker 1: of a psoric in your putrid breast? Often have you
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  Speaker 1: bested me in the secret councils of Issus. But now
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  Speaker 1: in the field of war, where men are truly gaged,
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  Speaker 1: your scabby heart hath revealed its sores to all the world. Calot,
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  Speaker 1: I spurn you with my foot, and with the words
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  Speaker 1: he turned to kick Exodar. My blood was up for minutes.
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  Speaker 1: It had been boiling at the cowardly treatment that had
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  Speaker 1: been according this once powerful comrade because he had fallen
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  Speaker 1: from the favor of Issus. I had no love for Exodar,
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  Speaker 1: but I cannot stand the sight of cowardly injustice and
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  Speaker 1: persecution without seeing red as through a haze of bloody mist,
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  Speaker 1: and doing things on the impulse of the moment that
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  Speaker 1: I presume I never should do. After mature deliberation, I
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: was standing close beside Exodar, as through it swung his
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  Speaker 1: foot for the cowardly kick. The degraded detor stood erect
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  Speaker 1: and motionless as a carven in image. He was prepared
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  Speaker 1: to take whatever his former comrades had to offer in
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  Speaker 1: the way of insults and reproaches, and take them in
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  Speaker 1: manly silence and stoism. But his third's foot swung, so
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  Speaker 1: did mine, and I caught him a painful blow upon
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  Speaker 1: the shin bone that saved Exodar from this added ignomy.
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  Speaker 1: For a moment there was tense silence. Then third, with
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  Speaker 1: a roar of rage, sprang for my throat, just as
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  Speaker 1: Exodar had done upon the deck of the cruiser. The
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  Speaker 1: results were identical. I ducked beneath his outstretched arms, and
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  Speaker 1: as he lunched past me, planeted a terrific right on
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  Speaker 1: the side of his jaw. The big fellow spun around
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  Speaker 1: like a top, his knees gave beneath him, and he
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  Speaker 1: crumpled to the ground at my feet. The Blacks gazed
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  Speaker 1: in astonishment, first at the still form of the proud
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  Speaker 1: detour lying there in the ruby dust of the pathway,
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  Speaker 1: then at me, as though they could not believe that
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  Speaker 1: such a thing could be. You asked me to bind Thurid.
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  Speaker 1: I cried, behold, and then I stooped beside the process
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  Speaker 1: straight form, tore the harness from it, and bound the
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  Speaker 1: fellow's arms and legs securely, as you have done to Exodar. Now,
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  Speaker 1: do you, likewise to Thurid take him before Issus, bound
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  Speaker 1: in his own harness, that she may see with her
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  Speaker 1: own eyes that there be one among you. Now, who
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  Speaker 1: is greater than the first born? Who are you? Whispered
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  Speaker 1: the woman who had first suggested that I attempt to
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  Speaker 1: bind Thurid. I am a citizen of two worlds. Captain
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  Speaker 1: John Carter of Virginia, Prince of the House of Tardos
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  Speaker 1: Mors Jeddak of Helium. Take this man to your Goddess
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  Speaker 1: as I have said, and tell her too that as
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  Speaker 1: I have done to Exidar and Thurid, so also can
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  Speaker 1: I do to the mightiest of her detours. With naked hands,
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  Speaker 1: with long sword or with short sword. I challenged the
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  Speaker 1: flower of her fighting men to combat. Come, said the
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  Speaker 1: officer who was guarding me back to Shador. My orders
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  Speaker 1: are imperative. There is to be no delay. Exodar, come
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  Speaker 1: you also. There was little of disrespect in the tone
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  Speaker 1: that the man used in addressing either Exodar or myself.
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  Speaker 1: It was evident that he felt less content for the
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  Speaker 1: former detor, since he had witnessed the ease with which
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  Speaker 1: I disposed of the powerful Thurid. That his respect for
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  Speaker 1: me was greater than it should have been for a
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  Speaker 1: slave was quite apparent from the fact that during the
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  Speaker 1: balance of the return journey he walked or stood always
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  Speaker 1: behind me, a drawn short sword in his hand. The
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  Speaker 1: return to the Sea of Omen was uneventful. We dropped
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  Speaker 1: down to the awful shaft in the same car that
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  Speaker 1: had brought us to the surface. There we entered the submarine,
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: taking the long dive to the tunnel far beneath the
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  Speaker 1: upper world, then through the tunnel and up again to
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  Speaker 1: the pool from which we had had our first introduction
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  Speaker 1: to the wonderful passageway from Omean to the Temple of Issus.
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: From the aisle of the submarine, we were transported on
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  Speaker 1: a small cruiser to the distant isle of Shador. Here
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  Speaker 1: we found a small stone prison and a guard of
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  Speaker 1: a half a dozen blacks. There was no ceremony wasted
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  Speaker 1: in completing our incarceration. One of the blacks opened the
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  Speaker 1: door of the prison with a huge key. We walked in.
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: The door closed behind us, The lock grated, and with
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  Speaker 1: the sound there swept over me again that terrible feeling
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  Speaker 1: of hopelessness that I had felt in the chamber of
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  Speaker 1: Mystery in the golden cliff beneath the gardens of the
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  Speaker 1: Holy Thurns. Then tars Tarkas had been with me, But
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: now I was utterly alone, in so far as friendly
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  Speaker 1: companionship was concerned. I fell to wondering about the fate
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  Speaker 1: of the great Thark and of his beautiful companion, the
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  Speaker 1: girl Thuvia. Even should they, by some miracle have escaped
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  Speaker 1: and been received and spared by a friendly nation. What
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  Speaker 1: hope had I of the succor which I knew they
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  Speaker 1: would gladly extend if it lay in their power. They
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  Speaker 1: could not guess my whereabouts or my fate, for none
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  Speaker 1: on all Barsoom even dreamed of such a place as this,
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  Speaker 1: Nor would it have advantaged me any had they known
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  Speaker 1: the exact location of my prison, For who could hope
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  Speaker 1: to penetrate to this buried sea in the face of
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  Speaker 1: the mighty navy of the first born. No, my case
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  Speaker 1: was hopeless. Well, I would make the best of it,
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  Speaker 1: And rising, I swept aside the brooding despair that had
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  Speaker 1: been endeavoring to claim me with the idea of exploring
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  Speaker 1: my prison, I started to look around. Exodar sat with
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  Speaker 1: bowed head upon a low stone bench near the center
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  Speaker 1: of the room in which we were. He had not
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  Speaker 1: spoken since Issus had degraded him. The building was roofless,
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  Speaker 1: the walls rising to a height of about thirty feet.
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  Speaker 1: Half Way up were a couple of small, heavily barred windows.
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  Speaker 1: The prison was divided into several rooms by partitions twenty
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  Speaker 1: feet high. There was no one in the room which
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  Speaker 1: we occupied, but two doors which led to other rooms
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  Speaker 1: were opened. I entered one of these rooms, but found
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  Speaker 1: it vacant. Thus I continued through several of the chambers,
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  Speaker 1: until in the last one I found a young red
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  Speaker 1: Martian boy sleeping upon the stone bench, which constituted the
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  Speaker 1: only furniture of any of the prison cells. Evidently he
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  Speaker 1: was the only other prisoner. As he slept, I leaned
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  Speaker 1: over and looked at him. There was something strangely familiar
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  Speaker 1: about his face, and yet I could not place him.
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  Speaker 1: His features were very regular, and like the proportions of
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  Speaker 1: his graceful limbs and body, beautiful in the extreme. He
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  Speaker 1: was very light in color for a red man, but
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  Speaker 1: in other respects he seemed a typical specimen of this
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  Speaker 1: handsome race. I did not awaken him, for sleep in
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  Speaker 1: prison is such a priceless boon that I have seen
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  Speaker 1: men transformed into raging brutes when robbed by one of
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  Speaker 1: their fellow prisoners. Of a few precious moments of it.
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  Speaker 1: Returning to my own cell, I found Exodar still sitting
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  Speaker 1: in the same position in which I had left him. Man,
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  Speaker 1: I cried, it will profit you nothing to mope. Thus
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  Speaker 1: it were no disgrace to be bested by John Carter.
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  Speaker 1: You have seen that in the ease with which I
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  Speaker 1: accounted for thurid you knew it before, when on the
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  Speaker 1: cruiser's deck you saw me slay three of your comrades.
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  Speaker 1: I would that you had despatched me at the same
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  Speaker 1: time he said, come, come, I cried, there is hope
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  Speaker 1: yet neither of us is dead. We are great fighters.
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  Speaker 1: Why not to freedom? He looked at me in amazement.
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  Speaker 1: You know not of what you speak, he replied. Issus
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  Speaker 1: is omniputent. Issius is omniscient. She hears now the words
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  Speaker 1: you speak. She knows the thoughts you think. It is
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  Speaker 1: sacrilege even to dream of breaking her commands. Rot Exodar,
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  Speaker 1: I ejaculated impatiently. He sprang to his feet in horror.
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  Speaker 1: The curse of Issus will fall upon you, he cried,
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  Speaker 1: in another instant. You will be smitten down, rithing to
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  Speaker 1: your death in horrible agony. Do you believe that exodar,
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: I asked, of course, who would dare doubt? I doubt, yes,
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  Speaker 1: And further I deny, I said, why, Exodar, you tell
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  Speaker 1: me that she even knows my thoughts. The Red men
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  Speaker 1: have all had that power for ages, and another wonderful power.
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  Speaker 1: They can shut their minds so that none may read
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  Speaker 1: their thoughts. I learned the first secret years ago. The
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  Speaker 1: other I never had to learn, since upon all barsoom
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  Speaker 1: is none who can read what passes in the secret
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  Speaker 1: chambers of my brain. Your Goddess cannot read my thoughts,
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  Speaker 1: nor can she read yours when you are out of sight,
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  Speaker 1: unless you will it. Had she been able to read mine,
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  Speaker 1: I am afraid that her pride would have suffered a
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  Speaker 1: rather severe shock when I turned, at her command to
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  Speaker 1: gaze upon the holy vision of her radiant face. What
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  Speaker 1: do you mean, he whispered in an affrighted voice, so
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  Speaker 1: low that I could scarcely hear him. I mean that
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: I thought her the most repulsive and vilely hideous creature
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  Speaker 1: my eyes ever had rested upon. For a moment, he
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  Speaker 1: eyed me in horror, stricken amazement, and then with a
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  Speaker 1: cry of blasphemer he sprang upon me. I did not
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  Speaker 1: wish to strike him again, nor was it necessary, since
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  Speaker 1: he was unarmed and therefore quite harmless to me. As
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  Speaker 1: he came, I grasped his left wrist with my left hand, and,
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: swinging my right arm about his left shoulder, caught him
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  Speaker 1: beneath the chin with my elbow and bore him backward
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  Speaker 1: across my thigh. There he hung helpless for a moment,
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  Speaker 1: glaring up at me in impotent rage. Exodar, I said,
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  Speaker 1: let us be friends for a year. Possibly we may
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  Speaker 1: be forced to live together in the narrow confines of
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  Speaker 1: this tiny room. I am sorry to have offended you,
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  Speaker 1: but I could not dream that one who had suffered
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  Speaker 1: from cruel injustice of Issus still could believe her divine.
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  Speaker 1: I will say a few more words, Exodar, with no
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: intent to wound your feelings further, but rather that you
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  Speaker 1: may give thought to the fact that while we live,
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  Speaker 1: we are still more the arbiters of our own fate
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  Speaker 1: than is any god. Issus you see, has not struck
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  Speaker 1: me dead, nor is she rescuing her faithful Exodar from
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  Speaker 1: the clutches of the unbeliever who defamed her fair beauty. No, Exidar,
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  Speaker 1: your Issus is a mortal old woman once out of
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  Speaker 1: her clutches, and she cannot harm you. With your knowledge
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  Speaker 1: of this strange land and my knowledge of the outer world,
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  Speaker 1: two such fighting men as you and I should be
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  Speaker 1: able to win our way to freedom, even though we
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  Speaker 1: died in the attempt. Would not our memories be fair
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: than as though we remained in servile fear to be
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  Speaker 1: butchered by a cruel and unjust tyrant. Call her goddess
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  Speaker 1: or mortal as you will. As I finished, I raised
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  Speaker 1: Exoter to his feet and released him. He did not
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  Speaker 1: renew the attack upon me, nor did he speak. Instead,
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  Speaker 1: he walked toward the bench, and, sinking down upon it,
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  Speaker 1: remained lost in deep thought for hours. A long time afterward,
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  Speaker 1: I heard a soft sound at the doorway leading to
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  Speaker 1: one of the other apartments, and looking up, beheld the
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  Speaker 1: red Martian youth gazing intently at us Koor. I cried,
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  Speaker 1: after the Red Martian manner of greeting Kowor, He replied,
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  Speaker 1: what do you hear? I await my death, I presume,
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: I replied, with a weary smile. He too smiled, a
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  Speaker 1: brave and winning smile. I also, he said, mine will
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  Speaker 1: come soon I looked upon the radiant beauty of Issus.
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  Speaker 1: Nearly a year since it has always been a source
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  Speaker 1: of keen. Wonder to me that I did not drop
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  Speaker 1: dead at the first sight of that hideous countenance and
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  Speaker 1: her belly by my first ancestor. But never was there
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: so grotesque a figure in all the universe that they
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  Speaker 1: should call such a one Goddess of Life, eternal Goddess
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  Speaker 1: of Death, mother of the Nearer Moon, and fifty other
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: equally impossible titles. Is quite beyond me. How came you here,
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: i asked, It is very simple. I was flying a
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: one man air scout far to the south when the
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: brilliant idea occurred to me that I should like to
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: search for the lost Sea of Chorus, which tradition places
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: near to the South Pole. I must have inherited from
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: my father a wild lust for adventure, as well as
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: a hollow where my bump of reverence should be. I
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: had reached the area of eternal ice when my prop
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: propeller jammed, and I dropped to the ground to make repairs.
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: Before I knew it, the air was black with fliers,
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: and a hundred of those first born devils were leaping
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: to the ground. All about me with drawn swords they
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  Speaker 1: made for me. But before I went down beneath them,
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: they had tasted of the steel my father's sword, and
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: I had given such an account of myself as I
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: know would have pleased my sire had he lived to
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  Speaker 1: witness it. Your father is dead, I asked. He died
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: before the shell broke. To let me step out into
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: a world that has been very good to me. But
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: for the sorrow that I have never the honor to
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: know my father, I have been very happy. My only
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: sorrow now is that my mother must mourn me as
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: she has for ten long years mourned my father. Who
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: was your father? I asked. He was about to reply
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: when the outer door of our prison opened, and a
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: burly guard entered and ordered him to his own quarters
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  Speaker 1: for the night, locking the door after him as he
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: passed through into the further chamber. It is Ishius's wish
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: that you two be confined in the same room, said
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: the guard, when he had returned to our cells. This
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: cowardly slave of a slave is to serve you well,
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: he said to me, indicating Exodar with a wave of
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: his hand. If he does not, you are to beat
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: him into submission. It is Isshus's wish that you heap
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: upon him every indignity and degradation of which you can conceive.
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: With these words, he left us. Exodar still sat with
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: his face buried in his hands. I walked aside and
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: placed my hand upon his shoulder. Exodar, I said, you
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: have heard the commands of Issus, but you need not
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: fear that I should attempt to put them into execution.
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  Speaker 1: You are a brave man, Exodar. It is your own
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: affair if you wish to be persecuted and humiliated. But
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: were I you, I should assert my manhood and defy
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: my enemies. I have been thinking very hard, John Carter,
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: he said, of all the new ideas you gave me
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: a few hours since, Little by little, I have been
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: piecing together the things that you said which sounded blasphemous
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: to me, then with the things that I have seen
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: in my past life and dared not even think about
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: for fear of bringing down upon me the wrath of Issus.
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: I believe now that she is a fraud, no more
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: divine than you or I more. I am willing to
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: concede that the first born are no holier than the
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: holy thurns, nor the holy theurns more holy than the
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: red men. The whole fabric of our religion is based
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: on superstitious belief in lies that have been foisted upon
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: us for ages by those directly above us, to whose
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: personal profit and aggrandizement it was to have us continue
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: to believe as they wished us to believe. I am
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: ready to cast off the ties that have bound me.
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: I am ready to defy Issus herself. But what will
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: it avail us be the first born gods or mortals.
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: They are a powerful race, and we are as fast
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: in their clutches as though we were already dead. There
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: is no escape. I have escaped from bad plights in
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: the past, my friend, I replied, Nor while life is
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: in me, shall I despair of escaping from the Isle
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: of Shador and the sea of Omean. But we cannot
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: escape even from the four walls of our prison. Urged Exodar.
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: Test this flint like surface, he cried, smiting the solid
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: rock that confined us. And look upon this polished surface.
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: None could cling to it to reach the top. I smiled,
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: that is the least of our troubles, Exodar, I replied,
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: I will guarantee to scale the wall and take you
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  Speaker 1: with me, if you will help with your knowledge of
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: the customs here to appoint the best time for the attempt,
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: and guide me to the shaft that lets from the
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: dome of this abysmal sea to the light of God's
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: pure air above. Night time is the best and offers
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: the only slender chance we have. For then men sleep,
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: and only a dozing watch nods in the tops of
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: the battleship. No watch is kept upon the cruisers in
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: the smaller craft. The watchers upon the larger vessels see
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: to all about them. It is night now, But I exclaimed,
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: it is not dark. How can it be night? Then
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: he smiled, you forget, He said that we are far
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: below ground. The light of the sun never penetrates here.
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: There are no moons and no stars reflected in the
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: bosom of Omean. The phosphorate light you now see pervading
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: this great subtraining vault emanates from the rocks that form
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: its dome. It is always thus upon Omean, just as
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: the billows are always as you see them, rolling, ever
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: rolling over a windless sea. At the appointed hour of night.
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: Upon the world above, the men whose duties hold them
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: here sleep, But the light is ever the same. It
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: will make escape more difficult, I said, And then I
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: shrugged my shoulders. For what pray is the pleasure of
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: doing any easy thing. Let us sleep on it tonight,
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: said Exodar. A plan may come with our awakening. So
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: we threw ourselves upon the hard stone floor of our
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: prison and slept the sleep of tired men. End of
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: Chapter ten.