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 muscles rolled exuberantly under my flesh, delighting in their liberty.
I walked slowly to the foot of the golden wall, where lay the golden scarf of the Tatrix, that scarf whose fluttering signal had initiated the Amusements.
I picked it up.
'Keep it as a gift,' rang a haughty voice from above me.
I looked up into the glittering, golden mask of the Tatrix.
'As something by which to remember the Tatrix of Tharna,' said the voice behind the golden mask, amused.
I grinned up at the golden mask, and taking the scarf slowly wiped the sand and sweat from my face.
Above me the Tatrix cried out in rage.
I looped the scarf about my shoulders and went to the centre of the arena. No sooner had I reached the centre than one of the sections of the wall rolled back, revealing a portal almost as high as the wall and perhaps thirty feet in width. Through this portal, in two long lines, lashed by overseers, yoked slaves harnessed in chains drew a great wooden platform mounted on heavy wooden wheels. I waited for the platform to emerge into the sunlight.
There were cries of awe and wonder, of pleasure, from the thrilled silver masks of Tharna.
Slowly as the creaking platform rolled out onto the sand, drawn by its struggling slaves, yoked like oxen, I saw the tarn revealed, a black giant, hooded, its beak belted together, a great bar of silver chained to one of its legs. It would not be able to fly, but it could move about, dragging the bar of silver. It, too, in Tharna, wore its yoke.
The platform drew closer, and to the wonder of the crowd I went to meet it. My heart was beating wildly.
I scrutinised the tarn.
Its lineaments were not unfamiliar. I examined the glistening, sable plumage; the monstrous yellow beak now cruelly belted together. I saw the great wings snap, smiting the air, the hurricane from their blow spilling slaves into the sand, tangling chains, as the great beast, lifting its head and smelling the open air, struck it with his wings.
It would not attempt to fly while hooded; indeed, I doubted that the bird would attempt to fly while it dragged its bar of silver. If it was the bird I thought it to be it would not futilely contest the weight of the degrading hobble, would not provide a spectacle of its helplessness for its captors. I know this sounds strange, but I believe some animals have pride, and if any did, I knew that this monster was one of them.
'Stand back,' cried one of the men with a whip.
I jerked the whip from his hand, and with my arm struck him aside. He flew tumbling into the sand. I threw the whip scornfully after him. I stood near the platform now. I wanted to see the ankle ring the bird wore. I noted with satisfaction that its talons were shod with steel. It was a War Tarn, bred for courage, for endurance, for combat in the skies of Gor. My nostrils drank in the wild, strong odour of the tarn, so offensive to some, yet an ambrosia to the nostrils of the tarnsman. It recalled the tarn cots of Ko-ro-ba and Ar, the Compound of Mintar in Pa-Kur' s City of Tents on the Vosk, the outlaw encampment of Marlenus among the crags of the Voltai Range.
As I stood beside the bird, I felt happy, though I knew it was intended to be my executioner. It was perhaps the foolish affection which a tarnsman feels for these dangerous, fierce mounts, almost as much a threat to him as to anyone else. Yet it was perhaps more, for as I stood by the bird, I felt almost as though I had come home to Ko-ro-ba, as though I stood here now with something in this grey, hostile city that knew me and mine, that had looked upon the Towers of the Morning, and had spread its wings above the glistening cylinders of Glorious Ar, that had carried me in battle and had borne Talena, my love, and me back from the siege of Ar to the Feast of our Free Companionship at Ko-ro-ba. I seized the ankle ring, and noted as I had expected that the name of its city had been filed away.
'This bird,' I said to one of the yoked slaves, 'is from Ko- ro-ba.' The slave shook in his yoke at the mention of this name. He turned away, eager to be unchained and led like a beast to the safety of the dungeons. Though to most of those who observed it would seem that the tarn was unusually quiet, I sensed that it was trembling, like myself, with excitement. It seemed uncertain. Its head was high, alert in the leather darkness of its hood. Almost inaudibly it sucked in air through the slits in its beak. I wondered if it had caught my scent. Then the great yellow beak, hooked for rending prey, now belted shut, turned curiously, slowly toward me.
The man in wrist straps, the burly fellow who had so delighted in striking me, he with the band of grey cloth wound about his forehead, approached me, his whip lifted.
'Get away from there,' he cried.
I turned to face him. 'I am not now a yoked slave,' I said. 'You confront a warrior.'
His hand tightened on the whip.
I laughed in his face. 'Strike me now,' I said, 'and I will kill you.' 'I am not afraid of you,' he said, his face white, backing away. His arm with the whip lowered. It trembled.
I laughed again.
'You will be dead soon enough,' he said, stammering on the words. 'A hundred tarnsmen have tried to mount this beast, and one hundred tarnsmen have died. The Tatrix decreed it os only to be used in the Amusements, to feed on sleen like you.'
'Unhood it,' I commanded. 'Free it!'
The man looked at me as though I might have been insane. To be sure, my exuberance astonished even me. Warriors with spears rushed forward, forcing me back, away from the tarn. I stood in the sand, away from the platform, and watched the ticklish business of unhooding the tarn.
No sound came from the sands.
I wondered what thoughts passed behind the golden mask of Lara, Tatrix of the city of Tharna.
I wondered if the bird would recognise me.
A nimble slave, wasting no time, and held on the shoulders of a fellow slave, loosened the belts that held the beak of the tarn and the hood that bound its head. He did not remove them but only loosened them, and as soon as he had, he and his fellow scurried for the safety of the open section of wall, which then slid noiselessly shut.
The tarn opened its beak and the belts that bound it loosely flew asunder. It shook its head, as if to throw water from its feathers and the leather hood was thrown far into the air and behind the bird. Now it spread its wings and smote the air, and lifted its beak and uttered the terrifying challenge scream of its kind. Its black crest, now unconfined by the hood, sprang erect with a sound like fire, and the wind seemed to lift and preen each feather.
