2 - Blades of Mars (11 page)

 
          
 
He thought that the news of the wanton razing
of villages and killing of the innocent had filtered through to the city,
though the Priosa were making every attempt to discount the rumours.

 
          
 
Nearly two hundred prisoners of all ages and
sexes were even now languishing in Jewar Bam's jails - ready for the great
'sacrifice' to be held in the city square.

 
          
 
All of these had received the death sentence
for their supposed aiding of Hool Haji and his supporters. Some of them had
known nothing of it - and the children, of course, had no part at all. This was
Jewar Baru's example. It would be a bloody example. It might enable him to
continue to hold the people down for another two or three years at most - but
surely no longer.

 
          
 
'But that is not the point,' I said to Hool
Haji. 'These people must somehow be saved - now.''

 
          
 
'Of course,' he agreed. 'And do you know the
name of one of those in Jewar Bani's jail - the man of whom they intend to make
a particular example?'

 
          
 
‘Who?'

 
          
 
‘Morahi Vaja. He was captured in the fighting.
There were special orders to take him alive!

 
          
 
'When is this "sacrifice" to take
place?' I asked.

 
          
 
Hool Haji put his head in his hands.

 
          
 
Tomorrow at
midday
,' he groaned. 'Oh, Michael Kane, what can
we do? How can we stop this happening?'

 
          
 
"There is only one thing we can do,' I
said grunly
. '
We must make use of the resources we
have. The four of us - you,
myself
, Jil Deera and Vas
Oola - must attack Mendisharling!'

 
          
 
'How can four men attack a great city?' he
asked incredulously.

 
          
 
'I will tell you how the attack can be made,'
I told him, 'but there is only a small chance of it succeeding.'

 
          
 
'Tell me your plan,' he said.

A Desperate Scheme

 
          
 
I STOOD at the controls of the airship and
stared through a porthole at the countryside ahead.

 
          
 
The three blue giants behind me said nothing.
There was nothing to say. Our plan, a simple one, had already been fully
discussed.

 
          
 
It was close on
midday
and we were making rapidly for
Mendisharljng. The plan depended primarily on the timing. If we failed, then at
least our failure would be spectacular and might at least point the way for
future revolutionaries.

 
          
 
The towers of the capital were now in sight.
The city was decorated as if for a festival. Banners flew from every tower and
mast - a gay occasion, a stranger would have thought. We knew better...

 
          
 
In the city square stood two
hundred stakes.
Tied to the stakes were two hundred prisoners - men,
women and children. Standing by them, with sacrificial knives ready in their hands,
were two hundred splendidly dressed Priosa.

 
          
 
In the centre of these circles of stakes, on a
platform, stood Jewar Baru himself, clad in his golden armour and carrying a
golden knife in his hand. Also on the dais was a stake. Tied to it was Morahi
Vaja, his face set, his eyes staring out at nothing but his own terrible fate.

 
          
 
Surrounding the square, ordered there by
decree of the upstart Bradhi, was the entire populace of Mendisharling, many
rows deep.

 
          
 
Jewar Baru stood with arms raised sunwards, a
cruel, nervous smile twitching his thin lips. He was waiting in ghoulish
anticipation for the sun to reach its zenith.

 
          
 
There was silence in the square save for the
puzzled murmurings of the young children, both in the crowd and at the stake,
who did not know what was about to happen. Their parents hushed them but did
not explain. How could they explain?

 
          
 
Jewar Baru's eyes were still fixed cm the sun
as he began to speak.

 
          
 
'Oh, Mendishar, there are those among you who
followed the Great Dark One and chose to go against the decrees of the Great
Light One whose material manifestation is the Life Giver, the sun. Moved by
wretched motives of self-importance and evil, they sent for the murderer and
coward Hool Haji to lead them in revolution against your chosen Bradhi. Out of
the depths of the dark wastelands came the interloper, out of the night, to
fight against the Priosa, the Children of the Sky,
the
Sons of the Great Light One. But the Great Light One sent a sign to Jewar Baru
and told him what was intended, and Jewar Baru went to fight against Hool Haji,
who fled and will never be seen again in the daytime, for he is a skulker in
the night. Thus the coward fled and the Great Light triumphed. His followers
are here today. They will be sacrificed to the Great Light not in a spirit of
vengeance, but as a gift to He Who Watches - the Great Light - so that
Mendishar may be purified and the death of these will wash away our guilt.'

 
          
 
The response to this superstitious hypocrisy
was not enthusiastic.

 
          
 
Jewar Baru turned towards Morahi Vaja, his
golden knife raised over the warrior's heart, ready to cut it from him in the
blood ritual.

 
          
 
The atmosphere was tense. Jewar Barn's
sacrifice of Morahi Vaja would be the signal for two hundred knives to rip out
two hundred innocent hearts!

 
          
 
The sun was only a few moments from its zenith
as Jewar Baru began his incantation.

 
          
 
He was halfway through it and in a state of
near-trance when the airship arrived, unnoticed until now, over the city. All
eyes were on Jewar Baru, or else were covered - though he had decreed that all
must see.

 
          
 
This is what we had counted on - why we had
timed the arrival so carefully even though it would give us only a few seconds
in which to try and save the victims in the square.

 
          
 
We had cut the engines and were drifting over
the square, falling lower and lower.

 
          
 
Then our shadow crossed Jewar Baru's dais just
as he was about to plunge the knife into Morahi Vaja's body.

 
          
 
He wheeled and looked up. All other eyes
followed his gaze.

 
          
 
Jewar Baru's eyes widened in
astonishment.

 
          
 
It was then, from within the cabin, that I
raised my arm and flung what I was holding at the upstart Bradhi.

 
          
 
As I had planned, the point of the javelin
grazed his throat - but it was sufficient.

 
          
 
Jewar Baru, as if struck rigid by the power of
some godlike being, became paralysed in the position he had been when looking
up at us.

 
          
 
For the moment we were fighting superstition
with superstition so that the appearance of our ship over the square would look
like the visitation of some angry god.

 
          
 
Early that morning I had manufactured a crude
megaphone and I now bellowed through this, my voice distorted and magnified
more by the echoes from the surrounding buildings.

 
          
 
'People of Mendishar, your tyrant is struck
down - strike down his minions!'

 
          
 
The populace began to murmur and their mood
was plainly angry as well as puzzled - though the anger was not directed at us.
It had been a move depending on psychology. We guessed that the paralysis of
Jewar Baru would make his followers lose heart and give heart to the ordinary
people.

 
          
 
Slowly the crowd began to move inward towards
the centre of the square while the Priosa, who began to look round in a panicky
way, were drawing their swords.

 
          
 
I brought the airship closer to the dais,
giving Hool Haji a chance to leap from ship to platform and stand beside his
frozen enemy.

 
          
 
'Hool Haji!' gasped Morahi Vaja from where he
was tied to the stake.

 
          
 
'Hool Haji!' This came from several Priosa who
had recognised the exiled prince.

 
          
 
'Hool Haji!'
This from those
folk of Mendisharling who had heard the name spoken by the Priosa.

            
‘Yes - Hool Haji!' cried my
friend, raising his sword high. 'Jewar Baru would have it that I am a coward
who deserts his people. But see - I enter his city all but single-handed to
save my friends and tell you to depose him now! Strike down the Priosa who have
persecuted you for so long. Now is your chance to avenge yourselves!'

 
          
 
For a moment there was virtual silence.
Then began a murmur which grew gradually louder and louder until it
became a roar.

 
          
 
Then the entire
populace of
Mendisharling were
moving in on the terrified Priosa.

 
          
 
Many folk died beneath the swinging swords of
the soldiers before the Priosa finally went down beneath the sheer weight of
numbers. But fewer - far fewer - died than would have died in the sacrifice, or
later in Jewar Baru's jails.

 
          
 
We watched as the tide of humanity engulfed
the Priosa in what appeared to be a single fluid action. When it was over - in
the short space of a few minutes - not one Priosa who had been prepared to
sacrifice a victim that day was left alive. Indeed, few of the corpses were
whole. They had literally been torn to pieces.
A fitting, if
bloody, end.

 
          
 
I had missed joining in the action, but our
plan had been based entirely on judging the mood of the people, the
psychological effect our appearance would have, and the result of my
poison-tipped spear - smeared with the paralysing stuff we had found in the
vats of the City of the Spider - on Jewar Bam. If our plan had failed we should
have been destroyed in as short a time as were our enemies.

 
          
 
I was trembling both with reaction and relief
as I swung down a rope-ladder to stand beside my friends on the dais. We cut
Morahi Vaja free. Down in the square, all around us, the other reprieved
victims were being released.

 
          
 
A great cheer now rose up for Hool Haji.

 
          
 
It lasted for many, many minutes. Meanwhile
Jil Deera and Vas Oola swung from the ship and moored her to the stake.

 
          
 
I stepped forward and cried to the people of
Mendishar: 'Salute your Bradhi - Hool Haji! Do you accept him?'

 
          
 
'We do!' came back the voice of the crowd.

 
          
 
Hool Haji raised his hand, moved by this
response.

 
          
 
‘Thank you. I have saved you from the rule of
the tyrant and helped you overcome him and his followers -though the true
saviour is Michael Kane. But now you must seek out the rest of the Priosa and
capture them, for they must all pay the penalty for their deeds over the past
years. Go now - arm yourselves with the weapons of your persecutors and scour
the streets for those who still live!'

 
          
 
The men began to stoop and pick up the swords
of the fallen Priosa. Then they were rushing through the streets and soon the
sounds of conflict echoed again in Mendisharling.

 
          
 
As the effect of the poison was beginning to
wear off, we bound Jewar Baru securely.

 
          
 
He was mumbling now and foam flicked his lips.
He was plainly quite mad - had been niad for some time, but this sudden defeat
had tipped the balance completely.

 
          
 
'What do you intend to do with him?' I asked
Hool Hajl

 
          
 
‘Try and kill him,' said my friend simply.

 
          
 
Now I had a feeling of anticlimax. It was over
- our object had been achieved rapidly. Again a sense of aimlessness overcame
me.

 
          
 
We established ourselves in Jewar Baru's
palace - the building which had housed generations of Hool Haji's ancestors
before the populace had misguidedly followed the upstart to their own downfall.

 
          
 
Morahi Vaja took charge of the parties seeking
out the Priosa who had escaped the initial coup. He left, but returned shortly
to tell us that a great many of the Priosa were still out on patrol or else had
fled the city. It would take time to locate them all - and many might well
escape.

 
          
 
This gave me an idea. Although doubtless the
Priosa who remained uncaught offered no real threat to Hool Haji, they should
not be allowed to go unpunished. Their crimes were manifold - the sadistic killing
of the innocent looming large among them.