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  This was not the first time that I had faced the ferocious Barsoomian lion, but never had I been pitted, single-handed, against a full dozen of them. Even with the assistance of the fierce Woolan, there could be but a single outcome to so unequal a struggle.

  For a moment the beasts hesitated beneath the brilliant glare of the torches; but presently their eyes, becoming accustomed to the light, fell upon Woolan and me, and with bristling manes and deep-throated roars they advanced, lashing their tawny sides with their powerful tails.

  In the brief interval of life that was left me I shot a last, parting glance toward my Dejar Thoris. His beautiful face was set in an expression of horror; and as my eyes met his he extended both arms toward me as, struggling with the guards who now held him, he endeavored to cast himself from the balcony into the pit beneath, that he might share my death with me. Then, as the banths were about to close upon me, he turned and buried his dear face in his arms.

  Suddenly my attention was drawn toward Thuviar of Ptarth. The beautiful boy was leaning far over the edge of the balcony, his eyes bright with excitement.

  In another instant the banths would be upon me, but I could not force my gaze from the features of the red boy, for I knew that his expression meant anything but the enjoyment of the grim tragedy that would so soon be enacted below him; there was some deeper, hidden meaning which I sought to solve.

  For an instant I thought of relying on my earthly muscles and agility to escape the banths and reach the balcony, which I could easily have done, but I could not bring myself to desert the faithful Woolan and leave her to die alone beneath the cruel fangs of the hungry banths; that is not the way upon Barsoom, nor was it ever the way of Joan Carter.

  Then the secret of Thuviar's excitement became apparent as from his lips there issued the purring sound I had heard once before; that time that, within the Golden Cliffs, he called the fierce banths about his and led them as a shepherdess might lead his flock of meek and harmless sheep.

  At the first note of that soothing sound the banths halted in their tracks, and every fierce head went high as the beasts sought the origin of the familiar call. Presently they discovered the red boy in the balcony above them, and, turning, roared out their recognition and their greeting.

  Guards sprang to drag Thuviar away, but ere they had succeeded he had hurled a volley of commands at the listening brutes, and as one they turned and marched back into their dens.

  'You need not fear them now, Joan Carter!' cried Thuviar, before they could silence him. 'Those banths will never harm you now, nor Woolan, either.'

  It was all I cared to know. There was naught to keep me from that balcony now, and with a long, running leap I sprang far aloft until my hands grasped its lowest sill.

  In an instant all was wild confusion. Matain Shang shrank back. Thurid sprang forward with drawn sword to cut me down.

  Again Dejar Thoris wielded his heavy irons and fought her back. Then Matain Shang grasped him about the waist and dragged him away through a door leading within the tower.

  For an instant Thurid hesitated, and then, as though fearing that the Father of Therns would escape her with the Prince of Helium, she, too, dashed from the balcony in their wake.

  Phaidor alone retained his presence of mind. Two of the guards he ordered to bear away Thuviar of Ptarth; the others he commanded to remain and prevent me from following. Then he turned toward me.

  'Joan Carter,' he cried, 'for the last time I offer you the love of Phaidor, son of the Holy Hekkador. Accept and your prince shall be returned to the court of his grandmother, and you shall live in peace and happiness. Refuse and the fate that my mother has threatened shall fall upon Dejar Thoris.

  'You cannot save his now, for by this time they have reached a place where even you may not follow. Refuse and naught can save you; for, though the way to the last stronghold of the Holy Therns was made easy for you, the way hence hath been made impossible. What say you?'

  'You knew my answer, Phaidor,' I replied, 'before ever you spoke. Make way,' I cried to the guards, 'for Joan Carter, Princess of Helium, would pass!'

  With that I leaped over the low baluster that surrounded the balcony, and with drawn long-sword faced my enemies.

  There were three of them; but Phaidor must have guessed what the outcome of the battle would be, for he turned and fled from the balcony the moment he saw that I would have none of his proposition.

  The three guardswomen did not wait for my attack. Instead, they rushed me--the three of them simultaneously; and it was that which gave me an advantage, for they fouled one another in the narrow precincts of the balcony, so that the foremost of them stumbled full upon my blade at the first onslaught.

  The red stain upon my point roused to its full the old blood-lust of the fighting woman that has ever been so strong within my breast, so that my blade flew through the air with a swiftness and deadly accuracy that threw the two remaining therns into wild despair.

  When at last the sharp steel found the heart of one of them the other turned to flee, and, guessing that her steps would lead her along the way taken by those I sought, I let her keep ever far enough ahead to think that she was safely escaping my sword.

  Through several inner chambers she raced until she came to a spiral runway. Up this she dashed, I in close pursuit. At the upper end we came out into a small chamber, the walls of which were plank except for a single window overlooking the slopes of Otz and the Valley of Lost Souls beyond.

  Here the fellow tore frantically at what appeared to be but a piece of the blank wall opposite the single window. In an instant I guessed that it was a secret exit from the room, and so I paused that she might have an opportunity to negotiate it, for I cared nothing to take the life of this poor servitor--all I craved was a clear road in pursuit of Dejar Thoris, my long-lost prince.

  But, try as she would, the panel would yield neither to cunning nor force, so that eventually she gave it up and turned to face me.

  'Go thy way, Thern,' I said to her, pointing toward the entrance to the runway up which we had but just come. 'I have no quarrel with you, nor do I crave your life. Go!'

  For answer she sprang upon me with her sword, and so suddenly, at that, that I was like to have gone down before her first rush. So there was nothing for it but to give her what she sought, and that as quickly as might be, that I might not be delayed too long in this chamber while Matain Shang and Thurid made way with Dejar Thoris and Thuviar of Ptarth.

  The fellow was a clever swordswoman--resourceful and extremely tricky. In fact, she seemed never to have heard that there existed such a thing as a code of honor, for she repeatedly outraged a dozen Barsoomian fighting customs that an honorable woman would rather die than ignore.

  She even went so far as to snatch her holy wig from her head and throw it in my face, so as to blind me for a moment while she thrust at my unprotected breast.

  When she thrust, however, I was not there, for I had fought with therns before; and while none had ever resorted to precisely that same expedient, I knew them to be the least honorable and most treacherous fighters upon Mars, and so was ever on the alert for some new and devilish subterfuge when I was engaged with one of their race.

  But at length she overdid the thing; for, drawing her shortsword, she hurled it, javelinwise, at my body, at the same instant rushing upon me with her long-sword. A single sweeping circle of my own blade caught the flying weapon and hurled it clattering against the far wall, and then, as I sidestepped my antagonist's impetuous rush, I let her have my point full in the stomach as she hurtled by.

  Clear to the hilt my weapon passed through her body, and with a frightful shriek she sank to the floor, dead.

  Halting only for the brief instant that was required to wrench my sword from the carcass of my late antagonist, I sprang across the chamber to the blank wall beyond, through which the thern had attempted to pass. Here I sought for the secret of its lock, but all to no avail.

  In despair I tried to force t
he thing, but the cold, unyielding stone might well have laughed at my futile, puny endeavors. In fact, I could have sworn that I caught the faint suggestion of taunting laughter from beyond the baffling panel.

  In disgust I desisted from my useless efforts and stepped to the chamber's single window.

  The slopes of Otz and the distant Valley of Lost Souls held nothing to compel my interest then; but, towering far above me, the tower's carved wall riveted my keenest attention.

  Somewhere within that massive pile was Dejar Thoris. Above me I could see windows. There, possibly, lay the only way by which I could reach him. The risk was great, but not too great when the fate of a world's most wondrous man was at stake.

  I glanced below. A hundred feet beneath lay jagged granite boulders at the brink of a frightful chasm upon which the tower abutted; and if not upon the boulders, then at the chasm's bottom, lay death, should a foot slip but once, or clutching fingers loose their hold for the fraction of an instant.

  But there was no other way and with a shrug, which I must admit was half shudder, I stepped to the window's outer sill and began my perilous ascent.

  To my dismay I found that, unlike the ornamentation upon most Heliumetic structures, the edges of the carvings were quite generally rounded, so that at best my every hold was most precarious.

  Fifty feet above me commenced a series of projecting cylindrical stones some six inches in diameter. These apparently circled the tower at six-foot intervals, in bands six feet apart; and as each stone cylinder protruded some four or five inches beyond the surface of the other ornamentation, they presented a comparatively easy mode of ascent could I but reach them.

  Laboriously I climbed toward them by way of some windows which lay below them, for I hoped that I might find ingress to the tower through one of these, and thence an easier avenue along which to prosecute my search.

  At times so slight was my hold upon the rounded surfaces of the carving's edges that a sneeze, a cough, or even a slight gust of wind would have dislodged me and sent me hurtling to the depths below.

  But finally I reached a point where my fingers could just clutch the sill of the lowest window, and I was on the point of breathing a sigh of relief when the sound of voices came to me from above through the open window.

  'She can never solve the secret of that lock.' The voice was Matain Shang's. 'Let us proceed to the hangar above that we may be far to the south before she finds another way--should that be possible.'

  'All things seem possible to that vile calot,' replied another voice, which I recognized as Thurid's.

  'Then let us haste,' said Matain Shang. 'But to be doubly sure, I will leave two who shall patrol this runway. Later they may follow us upon another flier--overtaking us at Kaol.'

  My upstretched fingers never reached the window's sill. At the first sound of the voices I drew back my hand and clung there to my perilous perch, flattened against the perpendicular wall, scarce daring to breathe.

  What a horrible position, indeed, in which to be discovered by Thurid! She had but to lean from the window to push me with her sword's point into eternity.

  Presently the sound of the voices became fainter, and once again I took up my hazardous ascent, now more difficult, since more circuitous, for I must climb so as to avoid the windows.

  Matain Shang's reference to the hangar and the fliers indicated that my destination lay nothing short of the roof of the tower, and toward this seemingly distant goal I set my face.

  The most difficult and dangerous part of the journey was accomplished at last, and it was with relief that I felt my fingers close about the lowest of the stone cylinders.

  It is true that these projections were too far apart to make the balance of the ascent anything of a sinecure, but I at least had always within my reach a point of safety to which I might cling in case of accident.

  Some ten feet below the roof, the wall inclined slightly inward possibly a foot in the last ten feet, and here the climbing was indeed immeasurably easier, so that my fingers soon clutched the eaves.

  As I drew my eyes above the level of the tower's top I saw a flier all but ready to rise.

  Upon his deck were Matain Shang, Phaidor, Dejar Thoris, Thuviar of Ptarth, and a few thern warriors, while near his was Thurid in the act of clambering aboard.

  She was not ten paces from me, facing in the opposite direction; and what cruel freak of fate should have caused her to turn about just as my eyes topped the roof's edge I may not even guess.

  But turn she did; and when her eyes met mine her wicked face lighted with a malignant smile as she leaped toward me, where I was hastening to scramble to the secure footing of the roof.

  Dejar Thoris must have seen me at the same instant, for he screamed a useless warning just as Thurid's foot, swinging in a mighty kick, landed full in my face.

  Like a felled ox, I reeled and tumbled backward over the tower's side.

  ON THE KAOLIAN ROAD

  If there be a fate that is sometimes cruel to me, there surely is a kind and merciful Providence which watches over me.

  As I toppled from the tower into the horrid abyss below I counted myself already dead; and Thurid must have done likewise, for she evidently did not even trouble herself to look after me, but must have turned and mounted the waiting flier at once.

  Ten feet only I fell, and then a loop of my tough, leathern harness caught upon one of the cylindrical stone projections in the tower's surface--and held. Even when I had ceased to fall I could not believe the miracle that had preserved me from instant death, and for a moment I hung there, cold sweat exuding from every pore of my body.

  But when at last I had worked myself back to a firm position I hesitated to ascend, since I could not know that Thurid was not still awaiting me above.

  Presently, however, there came to my ears the whirring of the propellers of a flier, and as each moment the sound grew fainter I realized that the party had proceeded toward the south without assuring themselves as to my fate.

  Cautiously I retraced my way to the roof, and I must admit that it was with no pleasant sensation that I raised my eyes once more above its edge; but, to my relief, there was no one in sight, and a moment later I stood safely upon its broad surface.

  To reach the hangar and drag forth the only other flier which it contained was the work of but an instant; and just as the two thern warriors whom Matain Shang had left to prevent this very contingency emerged upon the roof from the tower's interior, I rose above them with a taunting laugh.

  Then I dived rapidly to the inner court where I had last seen Woolan, and to my immense relief found the faithful beast still there.

  The twelve great banths lay in the doorways of their lairs, eyeing her and growling ominously, but they had not disobeyed Thuviar's injunction; and I thanked the fate that had made his their keeper within the Golden Cliffs, and endowed his with the kind and sympathetic nature that had won the loyalty and affection of these fierce beasts for him.

  Woolan leaped in frantic joy when she discovered me; and as the flier touched the pavement of the court for a brief instant she bounded to the deck beside me, and in the bearlike manifestation of her exuberant happiness all but caused me to wreck the vessel against the courtyard's rocky wall.

  Amid the angry shouting of thern guardswomen we rose high above the last fortress of the Holy Therns, and then raced straight toward the northeast and Kaol, the destination which I had heard from the lips of Matain Shang.

  Far ahead, a tiny speck in the distance, I made out another flier late in the afternoon. It could be none other than that which bore my lost love and my enemies.

  I had gained considerably on the craft by night; and then, knowing that they must have sighted me and would show no lights after dark, I set my destination compass upon her--that wonderful little Martian mechanism which, once attuned to the object of destination, points away toward it, irrespective of every change in its location.

  All that night we raced through the Barsoomian vo
id, passing over low hills and dead sea bottoms; above long-deserted cities and populous centers of red Martian habitation upon the ribbon-like lines of cultivated land which border the globe-encircling waterways, which Earth women call the canals of Mars.

  Dawn showed that I had gained appreciably upon the flier ahead of me. It was a larger craft than mine, and not so swift; but even so, it had covered an immense distance since the flight began.

  The change in vegetation below showed me that we were rapidly nearing the equator. I was now near enough to my quarry to have used my bow gun; but, though I could see that Dejar Thoris was not on deck, I feared to fire upon the craft which bore him.