Our block did not lose.
Savagely, our backs breaking, stinging under the frenzied lashing of our driver, cursing the colourful sands of the arena that mounted before the block as we dragged it foot by foot about the course, we managed to come first within the zone of the golden wall. When we were unchained we discovered we had been dragging one man who had died in the chains. Shamelessly we fell in the sand.
'The Battles of Oxen,' cried one of the silver masks, and her cry was taken up by ten and then a hundred others. Soon the stands themselves seemed to ring with the cry. 'The Battles of Oxen,' cried the women of Tharna. 'Let them begin!'
We were thrown on our feet again, and, to my horror, our yokes were fitted with steel horns, eighteen inches in length and pointed like nails. Andreas, as his yoke was similarly garnished with the deadly projections, spoke to me. 'This may be farewell, Warrior,' said he. 'I hope only that we are not matched.'
'I would not kill you,' I said. He looked at me strangely. 'Nor would I kill you,' he said, after a time. 'But,' he said, 'if we are matched and we do not fight, we will both be slain.'
'Then so be it,' I said.
Andreas smiled at me. 'So be it, Warrior,' he agreed.
Though yoked, we faced one another, men, each knowing that he had found a friend on the sands of the arena of Tharna.
My opponent was not Andreas, but a squat, powerful man with short-clipped yelow hair, Kron of Tharna, of the Caste of Metal Workers. His eyes were blue like steel. One ear had been torn from his head.
'I have survived the Amusements of Tharna three times,' he said as he faced me.
I observed him carefully. He would be a dangerous opponent.
The man with wrist straps circled us with the whip, his eye on the throne of the Tatrix. When the glove of gold once more lifted, the dread conflict would begin.
'Let us be men,' I said to my opponent, 'and refuse to slay one another for the sport of those in silver masks.'
The yellow, short-cropped head glared at me, almost without comprehension. Then it seemed as though what I had said struck, deep within him, some responsive chord. The pale blue eyes glimmered briefly; then they clouded. 'We would both be slain,' he said.
'Yes,' I said.
'Stranger,' said he, 'I intend to survive the Amusements of Tharna at least once more.'
'Very well,' I said, and squared off against him.
The hand of the Tatrix must have lifted. I did not see it for I did not care to take my eyes from my opponent. 'Begin,' said the man in wrist straps.
And so Kron and I began to circle one another, slightly bent so that the projections on the yoke might be used to best advantage.
Once, twice, he charged, but pulled up short, seeing if he could bring me forward, off balance to meet the charge. We moved cautiously, occasionally feinting with the terrible yokes. The stands grew restless. The man in wrist straps cracked his whip. 'Let there be blood,' he said.
Suddenly the foot of Kron swept through the white perfumed sand, bright with mica and red lead, and kicked a broad sheet of particles toward my eyes. It came like a silver and crimson storm, taking me by surprise, blinding me.
I fell on my knees almost instantly, and the charging horns of Kron passed over me. I reared up under his body, heaving it on my shoulder, backwards, over on the sands. I heard it hit heavily behind me, and heard Kron' s grunt of anger, and fear. I couldn' t turn and drive the spikes through him because I could not risk missing.
I shook my head wildly; my hands, yoked helplessly, tried vainly to reach my eyes, to tear the blinding particles from my vision. In the sweat and blindness, unsteady under the violently swinging yoke, I heard the squeals of the frenzied crowd.
Blinded I heard Kron regain his feet, lifting the heavy yoke that bound him. I heard his harsh breathing, like the snorting of an animal. I heard his short, quick, running steps in the sand, thudding toward me in a bull-like charge.
I turned my yoke obliquely, slipping between the horns, blocking the blow. It sounded like anvils hurled together. My hands sought his, but he kept his fists clenched and withdrawn as far as he could in the bracelet of the yoke. My hand clutched his withdrawn fist and slipped off, unable to keep its grip from the sweat, his and mine.
Once, twice more he charged, and each time I managed to block the blow, withstanding the shock of the crashing yokes, escaping the thrust of the murderous horns. Once I was not so fortunate and a steel horn furrowed my side, leaving a channel of blood. The crowd screamed in delight. Suddenly I managed to get my hands under his yoke.
It was hot, like mine in the sun, and my hands burned on the metal. Kron was a heavy, but short man, and I lifted his yoke, and mine, to the astonishment of the stands, which had fallen silent.
Kron cursed as he felt his feet leave the sand. Painfully, as he writhed, hung in the yoke, I carried him to the golden wall, and hurled him against it. The shock to Kron, bound in the yoke, might have killed a lesser man, breaking his neck.
Kron, still a captive of the yoke, now unconscious, slid down the wall, the weight of the yoke tumbling his inert body sideways in the sand. My sweat and the tears from the burning irritation of the sand had now cleared my vision.
I looked up into the glittering mask of the Tatrix. Beside her I saw the silver mask of Dorna the Proud.
'Slay him,' said Dorna the Proud, gesturing to the unconscious Kron. I looked about the stands.
Everywhere I saw the silver masks, and heard the shrill command, 'Slay him!' On every side I saw the merciless gesture, the extended right hand, palm turned inwards, the cruel, downward chopping motion. Those who wore the silver masks had risen to their feet, and the force of their cries pressed in on me like knives, the air itself seemed filled with the bedlam of their command, 'Slay him!'
I turned and walked slowly to the centre of the arena.
I stood there, ankle deep in the sand, covered with sweat and sand, my back open from the lash of the race, my side torn from the driving horn of Kron' s yoke. I stood unmoving.
The fury of the stands was uncontrolled.
As I stood there in the centre of the arena, alone, silent, aloof, not seeming to hear them, those hundreds, rather thousands, who wore the silver masks understood that their will had been spurned, that this creature alone on the sand beneath them had thwarted their pleasure. Standing, screaming, shaking their silver-gloved fists at me, they hurled their frustration, their invective and abuse on my head. The shrill rage of these masked creatures seemed to know no bounds, to verge on hysteria, on madness. Calmly I waited in the centre of the arena for the warriors.
The first man to reach me was the man in wrist straps, his face livid with rage. He savagely struck me across the face with his coiled whip. 'Sleen,' cried he, 'you have spoiled the Amusements of Tharna!' Two warriors hastily unbolted the horns from the yoke and dragged me to the golden wall. Once more I stood beneath the golden mask of the Tatrix.
I wondered if my death would be quick.
The stands fell silent. There was a tenseness in the air, as all waited for the words of the Tatrix. Her golden mask and robes glittered above me. Her words were clear, unmistakable.
'Remove his yoke,' she said.
I could not believe my ears.
Had I won my freedom? Was it thus in the Amusements of Tharna? Or had the fierce, proud Tatrix now realised the cruelty of the Amusements? Had that heart hidden in those cold, glistening robes of unfeeling gold at last relented, shown itself to be susceptible of compassion? Or had the call of justice at last triumphed in her bosom, that my innocence might be acknowledged, my cause vindicated, that I might now be sped honourably on my way from grey Tharna?
One emotion leapt in my heart, gratitude. 'Thank you, Tatrix,' I said. She laughed. '- that he may be fed to the tarn,' she added.
Chapter Fourteen: THE BLACK TARN
I was unyoked.
The other prisoners, still yoked, had been whipped from the arena, to the dungeons below, to be used yet again in the Amusements of Tharna, or perhaps sent to the mines. Andreas of Tor tried to remain at my side, to share my fate, but he was beaten and dragged senseless from the arena. The crowd seemed eager to observe what would happen next. It stirred impatiently beneath the billowing silk of the awnings, rearranged its silken cushions, partook distractedly of candies and sweetmeats distributed by grey-robed figures. Mingled with calls for the tarn, occasional taunts and jibes carried across the sand.
Perhaps the Amusements of Tharna were not spoiled at all; perhaps the best was yet to come? Surely my death beneath the beak and talons of a tarn would provide a gratifying spectacle for the insatiable masks of Tharna, adequate compensation for the disappointments of the afternoon, for the disregard of their will, for the defiance they had witnessed?
Though I sensed I was to die, I was not ill pleased at the manner. Hideous though the death might seem to the silver masks of Tharna, they did not know that I was a tarnsman, and knew these birds, their power, their ferocity; that in my way I loved them; and that as a warrior I would not find a death by tarn ignoble.
Grimly I smiled to myself.
Like most members of my Caste, more than the monstrous tarns, those carnivorous hawklike giants of Gor, I dreaded such creatures as the tiny ost, that diminutive, venomous reptile, orange, scarcely more than a few inches in length, that might lurk at one' s very sandal and then, without provocation or warning, strike, its tiny fangs the prelude to excruciating torment, concluding only with sure death. Among warriors, the bite of an ost is thought to be one of the most cruel of all gates to the Cities of Dust; far preferable to them are the rending beak, the terrible talons of a tarn.
I was not bound.
I was free to wander on the sand, enclosed only by the walls. I rejoiced in this new freedom, in the absence of the yoke, though I knew it was given me only in order to improve the spectacle. That I might run, that I might scream and grovel, that I might try to cover myself in the sand would surely delight the silver masks of Tharna.
I moved my hands and shoulders, my back. My tunic had long since been torn to my waist and now I ripped it away to my belt, angry at the tattered cloth. The
