away.
Astubux rushed forward, striking down with the staff, but this time the blow was simply blocked, smartly, as was the next, and the next. This the gladiator had decided. Then the staves were braced against one another and the gladiator, step by step, forced Astubux toward the edge of the circle, where men, in awe, drew back. But he did not force him from the circle. He forced him three times to its perimeter, and each time let him return to the center. Astubux was now wide-eyed, and sweating. Then the gladiator pressed down on Astubux’s staff and Astubux, in the center of the circle, was forced to his knees. Then the gladiator drew back the great staff and smote down, breaking the staff of Astubux. Astubux tried to move backward but was forced by the butt of the gladiator’s staff to his back. Then, for a moment, the beast appeared once more in the gladiator’s eyes, as he lifted his staff, like a spear. Then, again, it was gone. He drove the staff downward. It sank six inches into the soil beside Astubux’s head.
“Be pleased I did not choose to fight,” said the gladiator. He then turned about, and left the circle.
Astubux scrambled back out of the circle, and stood, outside it, breathing heavily.
The man at the edge of the circle who was holding the leash of Janina, it muchly looped, pulled her to her feet by it and led her to the gladiator. He placed the loops of the leash in his hand. The gladiator then wound the leash, again, as it had been before, about the neck of Janina. She then knelt beside him, the coils of rope on her neck, acknowledged his.
“What people are you?” asked the gladiator.
“We are the Wolfungs,” said Astubux, “the remnants of one of the five tribes of a once mighty people, one long since scattered, as legend has it, about the worlds.”
“And what people was that?” inquired the gladiator.
“And what are the other tribes?” asked the gladiator, for he was suddenly keenly interested in this matter.
“They may no longer exist,” said Astubux.
“What were they then?” asked the gladiator.
“The Darisi, the Haakons, the Basungs, and the parent tribe, the largest and fiercest of all the tribes, the Otungs.”
“Ortog believed me to be an Otung,” said the gladiator.
“Why?” asked Astubux.
“I do not know,” said the gladiator.
“Who are you?” asked Astubux.
“I do not know who I am,” said the gladiator.
“If you are an Otung,” said Astubux, “then they have not perished.”
“We would be of kindred peoples,” said a grizzled fellow.
“I do not know who I am,” said the gladiator. “I am only a peasant.”
“If you are of the Otungs,” said the grizzled fellow, “you are not a peasant, you are a warrior, a warrior among warriors, a warrior of a race of warriors.”
“No,” said the gladiator, shaking his head. “I am only a peasant.”
At that moment there was a terrifying crashing, and breaking and roaring in the forest. The very earth shook. Some hundreds of yards away flames leaped upward. A moment later smoke rose from the trees.
“It is the sign of the Drisriaks!” cried a man.
“They have found us!” cried another.
“There is no escaping from them!” cried another.
“Come!” said Astubux to the gladiator. He, followed by the gladiator and several of the other men, climbed the tall rock, from the summit of which they could survey the forest, for miles about. Janina, too, followed.
“There! See!” said Astubux, pointing.
A broad stream of fire, perhaps a mile in width, as though from the stars themselves, poured down into the forest.
“It is the sign of the Drisriaks!” said Astubux.
“No!” said a man. “It is different! Look!”
The broad swath of fire was being intelligently directed. It was carving, in the forest, a sign, one which the gladiator had seen before. Indeed, it had been on the armor which he had discarded. It was on the buckle of the belt, which he had left below, with the empty fire pistol and the sheathed knife. It had been, too, on the vessels of the Ortungen fleet.
“That, I think,” said the gladiator, “is the sign of Ortog, or of the Ortungs.”
“It is not the sign of the Drisriaks,” said a man, studying the pattern of flame and smoke.
“Ortog, as I understand it,” said the gladiator, “has left the house of the Drisriaks.”
“But he comes, as before, for the tribute, as he had before, for the Drisriaks,” said a man.
“I think so,” said the gladiator.
“Only to be gathered now for himself,” said the grizzled fellow.
“It would seem so,” said the gladiator.
“Their envoys will be at the village in a few days,” said Astubux, glumly.
“What will you do?” asked the gladiator.
“We will pay,” said Astubux. “What else is there to do?”
“Who is your chieftain?” asked the gladiator.
“We have no chieftain,” said Astubux.
“How can that be?” asked the gladiator.
“The Drisriaks kill our chieftains,” said Astubux.
“It is their way,” said the grizzled warrior.
“Now none will be chieftain,” said Astubux.
“Who would be so?” asked another.
“What are spears to the power of the Drisriaks?” asked another.
“And thus they deprive you of leadership?” asked the gladiator.
“And our manhood,” said another, bitterly.
“To the loss of such one might prefer death,” said the gladiator.
He recalled a courtroom, and an arena, far away.
“We have no leader,” said a man.
“Astubux speaks for us,” said a man.
“Yes,” said another.
“It is he who deals with the envoys,” said another.
“To my dishonor,” said Astubux.
“You must proclaim a chieftain,” said the gladiator.
“That he may die, that we then may all die?” said a man.
“It is a long time since one has been lifted on the shields,” said a man.
“You are free to go,” said Astubux.
They stood on the summit of that high, bare rock, and looked out upon the forest, where, in a roar of smoke and fire, in long lines, each a mile in width, burned into the forest itself, there blazed the sign of Ortog.
“See how they announce their arrival,” said a man.
“See how they insult us,” said another.
“I am not pleased with this,” said the gladiator.
“It has nothing to do with you,” said a man.
“It is our grief, not yours,” said Astubux.
“It should not be your grief, but your provocation,” said the gladiator.
