Stygian darkness of the corridor below.
When I had come through it before, I had guided myself by pressing my right hand against the wall at my side. Now Ozara followed the opposite wall; and when we had gone a short distance, turned into a corridor at our right that I had passed without knowing of its existence, because I had been following the opposite wall; and of course in the absolute darkness of the corridor, I had not been able to see anything.
We followed this new corridor for a long distance, but finally ascended a circular stairway to the next level above.
Here we came into a lighted corridor.
'If we can reach the other end of this without being discovered,' whispered Ozara, 'we shall be safe. At the far end is a false door that leads into the secret passageway ending at the door above the river.'
We both listened intently. 'I hear no one,' she said.
'Nor I.'
As we started down the long corridor, I saw that there were rooms opening from it on either side; but as we approached each door I was relieved to find that it was closed.
We had covered perhaps half the length of the corridor when a slight noise behind us attracted my attention; and, turning, I saw two men step from one of the rooms we had recently passed. They were turning away from us, toward the opposite end of the corridor; and I was breathing a sigh of relief, when a third man followed them from the room. This one, through some perversity of fate, glanced in our direction; and immediately he voiced an exclamation of surprise and warning.
'The Jeddara!' he cried, 'and the black-haired one!'
Instantly the three turned and ran toward us. We were about halfway between them and the door leading to the secret passage that was our goal.
Flight, in the face of an enemy, is something that does not set well upon my stomach; but now there was no alternative, since to stand and fight would have been but to insure disaster; and so Ozara and I fled.
The three men pursuing us were shouting at the tops of their voices for the evident purpose of attracting others to their assistance.
Something prompted me to draw my long sword as I ran; and it is fortunate that I did so; for just as we were approaching a doorway on our left, a warrior, attracted by the noise in the corridor, stepped out. Ozara dodged past him just as he drew his sword. I did not even slacken my speed but took him in my stride, cleaving his skull as I raced past him.
Now we were at the door, and Ozara was searching for the secret mechanism that would open it to us. The three men were approaching rapidly.
'Take your time, Ozara,' I cautioned her, for I knew that in the haste of nervousness her fingers might bungle the job and delay us.
'I am trembling so,' she said; 'they will reach us before I can open it.'
'Don't worry about them,' I told her. 'I can hold them off until you open it.'
Then the three were upon me. I recognized them as officers of the Jeddak's guard, because their trappings were the same as those worn by Zamak; and I surmised, and rightly, that they were good swordsmen.
The one in the lead was too impetuous. He rushed upon me as though he thought he could cut me down with his first stroke, which was not the part of wisdom. I ran him through the heart.
As he fell, the others were upon me but they fought more cautiously; yet, though there were two of them, and their blades were constantly thrusting and cutting in an endeavor to reach me, my own sword, moving with the speed of thought, wove a steel net of defense about me.
But defense alone would not answer my purpose; for if they could keep me on the defensive, they could hold me here until reinforcements came; and then, by force of numbers, I must be overcome.
In the instant, following a parry, my point reached out and pricked one of my adversaries sharply above the heart. Involuntarily, he shrank back; and as he did so I turned upon his companion and opened his chest wide.
Neither wound was mortal, but they slowed my adversaries down. Ozara was still fumbling with the door. Our situation promised to be most unpleasant if she were unable to open it, for now at the far end of the corridor I saw a detachment of warriors racing toward us; but I did not warn her to hurry, fearing that then, in her excitement, she would never be able to open it.
The two wounded men were now pressing me hard again. They were brave warriors and worthy foemen. It is a pleasure to be pitted against such, although there are always regrets when one must kill them. However, I had no choice, for then I heard a sudden cry of relief from Ozara.
'It is open, John Carter,' she cried. 'Come! Hurry!'
But now the two warriors were engaging me so fiercely that I could not break away from them.
But just for an instant was I held. With a burst of speed and a ferocity such as I imagine they had never beheld before, I took the battle to them. A vicious cut brought down one; and as he fell, I ran the other through the chest.
The reinforcements running toward us had covered half the length of the corridor as I hurried through the doorway after Ozara and closed the door behind me.
Now again we were in complete darkness. 'Hurry!' cried Ozara. 'The passageway is straight and level all the way to the door.'
Through the darkness, we ran. I heard the men behind me open the door, and knew that they were in the passageway at our rear; fully twenty of them there must have been.
Suddenly I ran full upon Ozara. We had come to the end of the passage, and she was standing at the door. This door she opened more quickly; and as it swung in, I saw the dark river flowing beneath us. Upon the opposite shore was the gloomy outline of the forest.
How cold and mysterious this strange river looked. What mysteries, what dangers, what terrors, lay in the sinister wood beyond?
But I was only vaguely conscious of such thoughts. The warriors who would seize us and carry us back to death were almost upon us as I took Ozara in my arms and jumped.
CHAPTER XXIV. BACK TO BARSOOM
Dark, forbidding waters closed over our heads and swirled about us as we rose to the surface; and, equally dark and forbidding, the forest frowned upon us. Even the moaning of the wind in the trees seemed an eerie warning, forbidding, threatening. Behind us, the warriors in the doorway shouted curses upon us.
I struck out for the opposite shore, holding Ozara in one arm and keeping her mouth and nose above water. She lay so limp that I thought she had fainted, nor would I have been surprised, for even a woman of the strongest fibre might weaken after having undergone what she had had to during the last two days.
But when we reached the opposite shore, she clambered out on the bank in full possession of all her faculties.
'I thought that you had swooned,' I said; 'you lay so very still.'
'I do not swim,' she replied; 'and I knew that if I struggled, it would hamper you.' There was even more to the erstwhile Jeddara of the Tarids than I had imagined.
'What are we going to do now, John Carter?' she asked. Her teeth were chattering from cold, or terror; and she seemed very miserable.
'You are cold,' I said; 'if I can find anything dry enough to burn, we shall have a fire.'
The girl came close to me. I could feel her body trembling against mine.
'I am a little cold,' she said, 'but that is nothing; I am terribly afraid.'
'But why are you afraid now, Ozara? Do you think that Ul Vas will send men after us?'
'No, it is not that,' she replied. 'He couldn't make men come into this wood at night, and even by daylight they would hesitate to venture into it on this side of the river. Tomorrow he will know that it will be useless to send after us, for tomorrow we shall be dead.'
'What makes you say that?' I demanded.
