Orthis, who was becoming the almost constant companion
of the chief, was standing beside the latter,
while I was twenty-five or thirty yards away, and
directly between Ga-va-go and the warriors who were approaching
with the prisoner, who would of necessity have
to pass close beside me. I remained where I was, therefore,
in order to get a better look at it, which was rather
difficult because it was almost entirely surrounded by No-vans.
However as they came opposite me, there was a
little break momentarily in the ranks, and I had my first
opportunity, though brief, for a closer observation of the
captive; and my comprehension was almost staggered by
what my eyes revealed to me, for there before me, was as
perfectly formed a human female as I had ever seen. By
earthly standards, she appeared a girl of about eighteen,
with hair of glossy blackness, that suggested more the
raven’s wing than aught else and a skin of almost marble
whiteness, slightly tinged with a creamy shade. Only in the
color of her skin, did she differ from earthly women in
appearance, except that she seemed far more beautiful than
they. Such perfection of features seemed almost unbelievable.
Had I seen her first posed motionless, I could
have sworn that she was chiseled from marble, yet there was
nothing cold about her appearance. She fairly radiated life
and feeling. If my first impression had been startling, it
was nothing to the effect that was produced when she
turned her eyes full upon me. Her black brows were two
thin, penciled arches, beneath which were dark wells of
light, vying in blackness with her raven hair. On either
cheek was just the faintest suggestion of a deeper cream,
and to think that these hideous creatures saw in that form
divine only flesh to eat! I shuddered at the thought and
then my eyes met hers and I saw an expression of incredulity
and surprise registered in those liquid orbs. She
half-turned her head as she was dragged past, that she
might have a further look at me, for doubtless she was as
surprised to see a creature like me as I was to see her.
Involuntarily I started forward. Whether there was an
appeal for succor in those eyes I do not know, but at least
they aroused within me instantly, that natural instinct of
a human male to protect the weak. And so it was that I
was a little behind her and to her right, when she was
halted before Ga-va-go.
The savage Va-gas’ chieftain eyed her coldly, while from
all sides there arose cries of “Give us flesh! Give us flesh!
We are hungry!” to which Ga-va-go paid not the slightest
attention.
“From whence come you, U-ga?” he demanded.
Her head was high, and she eyed him with cold dignity
as she replied, “From Laythe.”
The No-van raised his brows. “Ah,” he breathed, “from
Laythe. The flesh of the women from Laythe is good,”
and he licked his thin lips.
The girl narrowed her eyes, and tilted her chin a bit
higher. “Rympth!” she ejaculated, disgustedly.
As rympth is the name of the four-legged snake of Va-nah,
the inner lunar world, and considered the lowest and
most disgusting of created things, she could not well have
applied a more opprobrious epithet to the No-van chieftain,
but if it had been her intent to affront him, his expression
gave no indication that she had succeeded.
“Your name?” he asked.
“Nah-ee-lah,” she replied.
“Nah-ee-lah,” he repeated, “Ah, you are the daughter
of Sagroth, Jemadar of Laythe.”
She nodded in indifferent affirmation, as though aught
he might say was a matter of perfect indifference to her.
“What do you expect us to do with you?” asked Ga-va-go,
a question which suggested a cat playing with a mouse
before destroying it.
“What can I expect of the Va-gas, other than that they
will kill me and eat me?” she replied.
A roar of savage assent arose from the creatures surrounding
her. Ga-va-go flashed a quick look of anger and
displeasure at his people.
“Do not be too sure of that,” he snapped. “This be
little more than a meal for Ga-va-go alone. It would but
whet the appetite of the tribe.”
“There are two more,” suggested a bold warrior, close
beside me, pointing at me and at Orthis.
“Silence!” roared Ga-va-go. “Since when did you become
chief of the No-vans?”
“We can starve without a chief,” muttered the warrior
who had spoken, and from two or three about him arose
grumblings of assent.
Swift, at that, Ga-va-go reared upon his hind feet, and
in the same motion, drew and hurled his spear, the sharp
point penetrating the breast of the malcontent, piercing his
heart. As the creature fell, the warrior closest to him slit
his throat, while another withdrew Ga-va-go’s spear from
the corpse, and returned it to the chief.
“Divide the carcass among you,” commanded the chief,
“and whosoever thinks that there is not enough, let him
speak as that one spoke, and there shall be more flesh to
eat.”
Thus did Ga-va-go, chief of the No-vans, hold the obedience
of his savage tribesmen. There was no more muttering
then, but I saw several cast hungry eyes at me—hungry,
angry eyes that boded me no good.
In what seemed an incredibly short space of time, the
carcass of the slain warrior had been divided and devoured,
and once again we set out upon the march, in search of
new fields to conquer, and fresh flesh to eat.
Now Ga-va-go sent scouts far in advance of the point,
for we were entering territory which he had not invaded
for a long time, a truth which was evidenced by the fact
that there were only about twenty warriors in the tribe,
besides Ga-va-go, who were at all familiar with the territory.
Naturally quarrelsome and disagreeable, the No-vans
were far from pleasant companions upon that memorable
march, since they had not recovered from the fright and
discomforts of the storm and, in addition, were ravenously
hungry. I imagine that none, other than Ga-va-go, could
have held them. What his purpose was in preserving the
three prisoners, that would have made such excellent food
for the tribe, I did not know. However, we were not slain,
though I judged the fellow who carried me, would much
sooner have eaten me, and to vent his spite upon me he
trotted as much as he could, and I can assure you that he
had the most devilishly execrable trot I ever sat. I felt
that he was rather running the thing into the ground, for
he had an easy rack, which would have made it much more
comfortable for both of us, and inasmuch as I knew that
I was safe as long as I was under Ga-va-go’s protection,
I made up my mind to teach the fellow a lesson, which
I finally did, although almost as much to my discomfort as
his, by making no effort to ease myself upon his back so that
at every step I rose high and came down hard upon him,
sitting as far back as possible so as to pound his kidneys
painfully. It made him very angry and he threatened me
with all kinds of things if I didn’t desist, but I only answered
by suggesting that he take an easier gait, which at
last he was forced to do.
Orthis was riding ahead with Ga-va-go, who as usual led
the point, while the new prisoner astride a No-van warrior
was with the main body, as was I.
Once the warriors that we bestrode paced side by side,
and I saw the girl eyeing me questioningly. She seemed
much interested in the remnants of my uniform, which must
have differed greatly from any clothing she had seen in her
own world. It seemed that she spoke and understood the
same language that Ga-va-go used, and so at last I made
bold to address her.
“It is unfortunate,” I said, “that you have fallen into
the hands of these creatures. I wish that I might be of
service to you, but I also am a prisoner.”
She acknowledged my speech with a slight inclination of
her head, and at first I thought that she was not going to
reply, but finally looking me full in the face she asked,
“What are you?”
“I am one of the inhabitants of the planet Earth.”
“Where is that, and what is planet?” she asked, for I
had had to use the Earth word, since there is no word of
similar meaning in the language of the Va-gas.
“You know, of course,” I said, “that space outside of
Va-nah is filled with other worlds. The closest to Va-nah
is Earth, which is many, many times larger than your world.
It is from Earth that I come.”
She shook her head. “I do not understand,” she said.
She closed her eyes, and waved her hands with a gesture
that might have included the universe. “All, all, is rock,”
she said, “except here in the center of everything, in this
space we call Va-nah. All else is rock.”
I suppressed a smile at the vast egotism of Va-nah, but
yet how little different is it from many worldings, who
conceive that the entire cosmos exists solely for the inhabitants
of Earth. I even know men in our own enlightened
twenty-first century, who insist that Mars is not inhabited
and that the messages that are purported to come from our
sister planet, are either the evidences of a great world hoax,
or the voice of the devil luring people from belief in the
true God.
“Did you ever see my like in Va-nah?” I asked her.
“No,” she replied, “I never did, but I have not been to
every part of Va-nah. Va-nah is a very great world, and
there are many corners of it of which I know nothing.”
“I am not of Va-nah,” I told her again, “I am from
another world far, far away;” and then I tried to explain
something of the universe to her—of the sun and the
planets and their satellites, but I saw that it was as far
beyond her as are the conceptions of eternity and space
beyond the finite mind of Earth Men. She simply couldn’t
get it, that was all. To her, everything was solid rock that
we know as space. She thought for a long time, though,
and then she said, “Ah, perhaps after all there may be
other worlds than Va-nah. The great Hoos, those vast
holes that lead into the eternal rock, may open into other
worlds like Va-nah. I have heard that theory discussed,
but no one in Va-nah believes it. It is true, then!” she exclaimed
brightly, “and you come from another world like
Va-nah. You came through one of the Hoos, did you not?”
“Yes, I came through one of the Hoos,” I replied—the
word means hole in the Va-gas tongue—“but I did not
come from a world like Va-nah. Here you live upon the
inside of a hollow sphere. We Earth Men live upon the
outside of a similar though much larger sphere.”
“But what holds it up?” she cried, laughing. It was the
first time that she had laughed, and it was a very contagious
laugh, and altogether delightful. Although I knew that it
would probably be useless, I tried to explain the whole
thing to her, commencing with the nebular hypothesis, and
winding up with the relations that exist between the Moon
and the Earth. If I didn’t accomplish anything else, I at
least gave her something to distract her mind from her
grave predicament, and to amuse her temporarily, for she
laughed often at some of my statements. I had never seen
so gay and vivacious a creature, nor one so entirely beautiful
as she. The single, sleeveless, tunic-like garment that
she wore, fell scarcely to her knees and as she bestrode the
No-van warrior, it often flew back until her thighs, even,
were exposed. Her figure was divinely perfect, its graceful
contours being rather accentuated than hidden by the
diaphanous material of her dainty covering; but when she
laughed, she exposed two rows of even white teeth that
would be the envy of the most beautiful of Earth Maids.
“Suppose,” she said, “that I should take a handful of
gravel and throw it up in the air. According to your theory
the smaller would all commence to revolve about the larger
and they would go flying thus wildly around in the air forever,
but that is not what would happen. If I threw a
handful of gravel into the air it would fall immediately to
the ground again, and if the worlds you tell me of were cast
thus into the air, they too would fall, just as the gravel
falls.”
It was useless, but I had known that from the beginning.
What would be more interesting would be to question her,
and that I had wished to do for some time, but she always
put me off with a pretty gesture and a shake of her head,
insisting that I answer some of her questions instead, but
this time I insisted.
“Tell me, please,” I asked, “how you came to the spot
where you were captured, how you flew, and what became
of your wings, and why, when they tore them from you, it
did not injure you?”
She laughed at that quite merrily.
“The wings do not grow upon us,” she explained, “we
make them and fasten them upon our arms.”
“Then you can support yourself in the air with wings
fastened to your arms?” I demanded, incredulously.
“Oh, no,” she said, “the wings we use simply for propelling
ourselves through the air. In a bag, upon our backs,
we carry a gas that is lighter than air. It is this gas which
supports us, and we carry it in such quantities as to maintain
a perfect equilibrium, so that we may float at any altitude,
or with our wings rise or fall gently; but as I hovered
over Laythe, came the air that runs, and seizing me
with its strong arms bore me off across the surface of
Va-nah. Futilely I fought against it until I was spent and
weak, and then it dropped me into the clutches of the
Va-gas, for the gas in my bag had become depleted. It was
not intended to carry me aloft for any great length of time.”
She had used a word which, when I questioned her, she
explained so that I understood that it meant time, and I
asked her what she meant by it and how she could measure
it, since I had seen no indication of the Va-gas having any
conception of a measurable aspect of duration.
Nah-ee-lah explained to me that the Va-gas, who were a
lower order, had no means of measuring time, but that the
U-ga, the race to which she belonged, had always been able
to compute time through their observation of the fact that
during certain periods the bottoms of the hoos, or craters,
were illuminated, and for another period they were dark,
and so they took as a unit of measure the total period from
the beginning of this light in a certain crater to its beginning
again, and this they called a ula, which corresponds
with a sidereal month. By mechanical means they divide
this into a hundred parts, called ola, the duration of each
of which is about six hours and thirty-two minutes earth
time. Ten ulas make a keld, which one might call the lunar
year of about two hundred and seventy-two days earth time.
I asked her many questions and took great pleasure in
her answers, for she was a bright, intelligent girl, and although
I saw many evidences of regal dignity about her,
yet her manner toward me was most natural and unaffected,
and I could not help but feel that she occupied a position
of importance among her own people.
Our conversation was suddenly interrupted, however, by
a messenger from the point, who came racing back at tremendous
speed, carrying word from Ga-va-go that the scouts
were signaling that they had discovered a large village, and
that the warriors were to prepare to fight.
Immediately we moved up rapidly to Ga-va-go, and then
we all advanced toward the scout who could be seen upon
a knoll far ahead. We were cautioned to silence, and as
we moved at a brisk canter over the soft, pale lavender
vegetation of the inner Moon, the feet of the Va-gas giving
forth no sound, the picture presented to my earthly
eyes was weird and mysterious in the extreme.
When we reached the scout, we learned that the village
was situated just beyond a low ridge not far distant, so
Ga-va-go gave orders that the women, the children, and the
three prisoners should remain under a small guard where
we were until they had topped the ridge, when we were to
advance to a position where we might overlook the village,
and if the battle was against the No-vans we could retreat
to a point which he indicated to the warriors left to guard
us. This was to be the rendezvous, for following defeat
the Va-gas warriors scatter in all directions, thus preventing
any considerable body of them being attacked and destroyed
by a larger body of the pursuing enemy.
As we stood there upon the knoll, watching Ga-va-go and
his savage warriors galloping swiftly toward the distant
ridge, I could not but wonder that the inhabitants of the
village which they were about to attack had not placed
sentinels along the ridge to prevent just such a surprise as
this, but when I questioned one of the warriors who had
been left to guard us, he said that not all the Va-gas tribes
were accustomed to posting sentinels when they felt themselves
reasonably safe from attack. It had always been
Ga-va-go’s custom, however, and to it they attributed his
supremacy among the other Va-gas tribes over a large territory.
“After a tribe has made a few successful raids and returned
victorious, they are filled with pride,” the warrior
explained to me, “and presently they begin to think that
no one dares to attack them and then they grow careless,
and little by little the custom of posting sentinels drops into
disuse. The very fact that they have no sentinels indicates
that they are a large, powerful and successful tribe. We
shall feed well for a long time.”
The very idea of the thought that was passing through
his mind, was repellent in the extreme, and I fairly shuddered
when I contemplated the callousness with which this
creature spoke of the coming orgy, in which he hoped to
devour flesh of his own kind.
Presently we saw our force disappear beyond the ridge,
and then we too, advanced, and as we moved forward there
came suddenly to us, from the distance the fierce and savage
war cry of the No-vans and a moment later it was answered
by another no less terrible, rising from the village beyond
the ridge. Our guards hastened us then, to greater speed,
until, at a full run, we mounted the steep slope of the ridge
and halted upon its crest.
Below us lay a broad valley, and in the center a long,
beautiful lake, the opposite shore of which was clothed in
forest while that nearest us was open and park-like, dotted
here and there with beautiful trees, and in this open space
we descried a large village.
The ferocity of the scene below us was almost indescribable.
The No-vans warriors were circling the village
at a rapid run, attempting to keep the enemy in a compact
mass within, where it would present a better target for
their spears. Already the ground was dotted with corpses.
There were no wounded, for whenever one fell the nearest
to him whether friend or foe cut his throat, since the victors
would devour them all without partiality. The females
and the young had taken refuge in the huts, from the doorways
of which they watched the progress of the battle.
The defenders attempted repeatedly to break through the
circling No-vans. The warrior with whom I had been talking
told me that if they were successful the females and the
young would follow them through the break scattering in
all directions, while their warriors attempted to encircle the
No-vans. It was almost immediately evident that the advantage
lay with the force that succeeded in placing this
swift-moving circle about its enemy, and keeping the enemy
within it until they had been dispatched, for those in the
racing circle presented a poor target, while the compact
mass of warriors milling in the center could scarce be
missed.
Following several unsuccessful attempts to break through
the ring of savage foemen the defenders suddenly formed
another smaller ring within, and moving in the opposite
direction to the No-vans, raced in a rapid circle. No longer
did they cast spears at the enemy, but contented themselves
with leaping and bounding at a rapid gait. At first it
seemed to me that they had lost their heads with terror,
but at last I realized that they were executing a strategic
maneuver which demonstrated both cunning and high discipline.
In the earlier stages of the battle each side had
depended for its weapons upon those hurled by the opposing
force, but now the defenders hurled no weapons, and
it became apparent that the No-vans would soon no longer
have spears to cast at them. The defenders were also lessening
their casualties by moving in a rapid circle in a
direction opposite to that taken by the attackers, but it must
have required high courage and considerable discipline to
achieve this result since it is difficult in the extreme to compel
men to present themselves continuously as living targets
for a foe while they themselves are permitted to inflict no
injury upon the enemy.
Ga-va-go apparently was familiar with the ruse, for suddenly
he gave a loud cry which was evidently a command.
Instantaneously, his entire force wheeled in their tracks and
raced in the opposite direction paralleling the defenders of
the village, and immediately thereafter cast their remaining
spears at comparatively easy targets.
The defenders, who were of the tribe called Lu-thans,
wheeled instantly to reverse the direction of their flight.
Those wounded in the sudden onslaught stumbled and fell,
tripping and impeding the others, with the result that for
an instant they were a tangled mass, without order or
formation. Then it was that Ga-va-go and his No-vans
leaped in upon them with their short, wicked sword-daggers.
At once the battle resolved itself into a ferocious and bloody
hand-to-hand conflict, in which daggers and teeth and three-toed
paws each did their share to inflict injury upon an
antagonist. In their efforts to escape a blow, or to place
themselves in an advantageous position, many of the combatants
leaped high into the air, sometimes between thirty
and forty feet. Their shrieks and howls were continuous
and piercing. Corpses lay piled so thick as to impede the
movements of the warriors, and the ground was slippery
with blood, yet on and on they fought, until it seemed that
not a single one would be left alive.
“It is almost over,” remarked the warrior at my side.
“See, there are two or three No-vans now attacking each
Lu-than.”
It was true, and I saw that the battle could last but a
short time. As a matter of fact it ended almost immediately,
the remaining Lu-thans suddenly attempting to
break away and scatter in different directions. Some of
them succeeded in escaping, possibly twenty but I am sure
that there were not more than that, and the rest fell.
Ga-va-go and his warriors did not pursue the few who
had escaped, evidently considering that it was not worth the
effort, since there were not enough of them to menace the
village, and there was already plenty of meat lying fresh
and warm upon the ground.
We were summoned now, and as we filed down into the
village, great was the rejoicing of our females and young.
Guards were placed over the women and children of the
defeated Lu-thans, and then at a signal from Ga-va-go, the
No-vans fell upon the spoils of war. It was a revolting
spectacle, as mothers devoured their sons, and wives, their
husbands. I do not care to dwell upon it.
When the victors had eaten their fill, the prisoners were
brought forth under heavy guard, and divided by the Va-gas
between the surviving No-vans warriors. There was no
favoritism shown in the distribution of the prisoners, except
that Ga-va-go was given first choice, and received also
those that remained after as nearly equal a distribution as
possible had been made. I had expected that the male children
would be killed, but they were not, being inducted into
the tribe upon an equal footing with those that had been
born into it.
Being capable of no sentiments of either affection or
loyalty, it is immaterial to these creatures to what tribe they
belong, but once inducted into a tribe, the instinct of self-preservation
holds them to it, since they would be immediately
slain by the members of any other tribe.
I learned shortly after this engagement that Ga-va-go had
lost fully half his warriors, and that this was one of the
most important battles that the tribe had ever fought. The
spoils, however, had been rich, for they had taken over ten
thousand women and fully fifty thousand young, and great
quantities of weapons, harness, and apparel.
The flesh that they could not eat was wrapped up and
buried, and I was told that it would remain in excellent
condition almost indefinitely.
