by: Rick Johnson 
PO Box 40451
Tucson, Az.
85717
RikJohnson@juno.com
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I loved the sunsets on Barsoom. They were the only things I ever saw that were more beautiful than the ones in Arizona. Irish and English sunsets are poor fare indeed, the skies are always overcast and half the time you don’t knew when the sun has set. The sunsets in Arabia have potential but there is usually nothing there but flat desert and a good sunset needs mountains for contrast. Toonol, or rather Ardane where I now lived, was a swamp so I had learned to appreciate the trees as a replacement for the mountains. It’s not as good, but still the red dust in the sky produced reds and oranges and even yellows that had to be seen to believed.
We were sitting on the flight deck watching the event, Florina my slave-girl in my arms and our cloak wrapped around us for warmth when the guard interrupted. “Gan Kanar wishes your attendance,” He said and waited.
“Of course, I shall attend immediately!” I informed the guard as I rose and helped Florina to her feet. We were near the edge so I wrapped my tail around a carving to steady myself and we returned to the deck where Florina bowed to the guard for a slave must always show considerable respect to any free man. She then bowed to me and said, “My Lord, I shall return to your rooms and await your orders.” I nodded, kissed her and left with the guard.
“Lord Innis,” he began for the Jed had ordered after one successful mission that my Irish title be accepted here on Barsoom. “Why do you treat that slave with such care? She is just property and you can have others or even more if you wish?”
“Florina suits my needs well. I have no desire for another. And we Irish understand your Barsoomian ways of courtesy to women, only I choose to extend these to all women, free or chained.” Of course he didn’t understand for to him she was simply property. I had offered and wished to free her many times in the past, but Barsoom custom dictated that as a slave, we could be lovers and love each other, but once freed, that part of her life would never be repeated or mentioned. And I would have to court her again through her parents who would not be happy to see a woman of their house mated with an alien. So her remaining enslaved as the only way we could be together. I hated it for I had been a galley slave in Arabia and knew well the lash and the memory of Oliver Cromwell ran deep in my blood. He had sought the solution to Irish rebellion against the conquering English was to simply sell one of every five Irish as slaves to the New World. The Americans talk of slavery focusing on black Africans but they forgot that a million Irish were also in their chains.
Still, she had accepted her situation with better grace than I did.
“Have you any idea of what I am to do now?” I asked. My king saw in me a useful curiosity. Despite my Jasoomian birth, the Demons who had abducted me as a teen had changed me into something that even the Barsoomian tolerance had difficulty accepting. Even Florina sometimes would look away rather than see my antennae or cat’s eyes. But those adaptations the Demons had made to enable me to operate their starships also worked well in the Toonol Swamps for I saw little difference between crawling about in the struts of a ship in zero-gravity and climbing the trees of the swamp in .38 gravity. Branches or struts, my tarsial feet and prehensile could still grasp them easily.
And so I was usually sent to spy out areas where a Red Man would be bogged down in the muck and a flier would be seen. Plus my ability to see in the dark and the Red Man’s inability to detect me telepathically was always useful.
“No,” he answered. “I am not privy to the Jed’s wishes.” The man was a simple guard and I a noble, of sorts, so of course he would be told only what he needed to know.
I entered the throne room alone as was my custom and waited for the Jed to notice me. I often practiced walking silently and as no Barsoomian could read a Jasoomian mind, they never knew we were around until we made a noise. I know it was petty, but my life depended on this man and his good graces so the only thing I had was this. Gan Kanar had such control I was unable to read even his slightest thought but like all Barsoomians, his telepathic broadcasts allowed me to know he was there as if he were humming out loud. No Red Man could approach another without being detected by their telepathy and my invisibility in that area made me valuable to him. With some twenty men and women visiting Barsoom over the centuries, and near a half-dozen of us still alive, many nations had found our Earthly strength and mental invisibility useful.
Eventually he looked up and started as he saw me standing there, well out of sword range but still nearby. “How long have you stood there?” he demanded.
I bowed to him and replied, “Only a moment, My Lord. You appeared to be busy with important matters and I did not wish to disturb your thoughts. How may I serve my Jed?”
He glared but could do little so he explained, “I have a task for you.” Of course he did. I made him nervous and he called for me only to show me off to visitors or to send me on some mission that none of his other men could accomplish. He knew that with my Earthly strength, enhanced by the Demons, my abilities to jump and climb and my telepathic invisibility, were I to take up the trade of the Gorthan Assassin, I could easily enter his or any room and hide in the rafters to kill at my leisure. So he tolerated my quirks such as my games of being invisible, my desire for the slave Florina and my almost total inability to dance the Dances of Barsoom.
“I am told you are becoming an adequate swordsman though this is due more your strength than skill. I am also told that you are learning the written languages and customs of Phundahl, Amhor and even far off Helium. Why?” He was asking not demanding so I told him the truth though I could easily lie to him.
“My Lord, when my people were conquered by the English, our enemies spoke only their own language and all were illiterate. My people spoke our native Gaelic and could read and write it easily and we found it tactically advantageous to know the spoken and written languages of our enemies. We could easily read their dispatches and listen to their plans but they could not do the same for us. I serve you in a like manner. I study Phundahl to serve you against your enemies and I study Amhorian for some day I will return my slave to her family. And as for Helium, they seem to be very successful in their conquests. It would be useful to know theirs as well in case their eyes are cast in this direction.”
He accepted my explanation with a grunt and motioned me to the table upon which was a map of the Toonolian Marshes. The Marshes stretch some 1800 miles east to west by 600 miles north to south and were the remainder of a huge canyon so large that the cliffs were over the horizon. Toonol was to the eastern side and Phundahl to the west. A small river drained off excess water some 200 miles east of that city and hills and mountains protected and isolated Phundahl in the west. Within the Marshes were a number of cities like Ardane, subject to either Toonol or Phundahl with a few independent cities in the middle and others near the edges of the marsh in the desert. There was also an arc of forts that stretched roughly north to south-south-east, each numbered in no particular order.
Gan Kanar pointed to one, #16 that was at the edge of the Marsh in the north. “This is one of the forts that protect the Empire from Phundahl. I am charged with these six but this one, number sixteen, has failed to communicate. When I sent reinforcements, they report the fort deserted, then a month later, they had vanished also. I am unwilling to sacrifice more lives until I know what has happened so you and your slave will go there and seek answers.”
“Why Florina?” I asked. “Is that not dangerous?”
“First of all, she is only a slave so if she dies, no loss to me. Second two eyes can see more than one, especially of one is a slave-girl who may wander unnoticed. And third, there is no evidence of violence. No blood, no bodies, simply as if the soldiers had walked into the marsh or desert to vanish. You leave before sunrise.” And with that I was dismissed.
I thought about this when I returned to my rooms. “He wants you to go with me. I wonder why.” I said.
She sat in my lap and let me play with her hair which she had found relaxed me when I was stressed. “Gan Kanar is not a fool. He rarely speaks all that he knows or fully reveals his plans. Nor is he known for wasting resources and he knows that if something happens to me, you will take revenge or leave so it must not be as dangerous as you think. We should take our own food and water in case of poison or contamination.” She then rose from my lap and walked away to pack.
I enjoyed the sight of her as she walked. I usually found Florina’s body as uncomfortable as she found mine. I preferred my women to be built like a woman and Red Woman, being egg-bearers, had no need for breasts other than to attract a man so hers were far smaller than I liked. That and her thin pubic hair gave her the body of a girl younger than I liked. But her face was that of a mature woman, beautiful to extreme and her long, wavy black hair was terribly exciting. Especially as I watched her walk away, her hips and hair swinging with her movements. But mostly, I valued her mind and advice. She saw things I was too new to this world to understand and I found that my life worked easier if I listened to her. Even were we not intimate, I would treasure her for her mind and advice.
We left before dawn as ordered, me huddled behind the windscreen of my flier, wrapped in furs and Florina behind commenting on the crispness of the day. Her Barsoomian body handled the cold far easier than my own and I would freeze in temperatures that she could walk around in naked.
The fort itself was small, some 500 feet along each of it’s four walls, walls that were twenty feet high and at each corner was a thirty foot round tower. On one side was the traditional round gate, a concession to the ancient past though this gate parted in the middle and swung outwards instead of rolling aside. Instead of Earthly crenels and merlons, the walls were flat and had loopholes through which to shoot. We landed without challenge and I observed at one corner a paddock for thoats including the stables and feed bins. The other three corners and walls had rooms against those walls whose roofs could provide a place for the defenders to stand while on watch or fighting. The entire center was a list or parade ground or landing field so we set down there.
“No one,” my lover commented. She refused to allow me to call her ‘my princess’ for that was a term of endearment reserved to those engaged and our status prevented such.
“Where is the artillery?” I asked, my military mind immediately noticing that the towers had no cannons which should be common here. I leapt over the side and found a ring to which I tied our flier then after ensuring that my weapons were loose and ready, I sauntered over to the Dwar’s office. I knocked, not really expecting any answer but entering a Barsoomian officer’s office unexpectedly is asking for an explosive bullet in your chest.
The office was empty as was his personal sleeping area behind. I left the office and began a quick look around the camp, glancing into each room then moving on, Florina watching the entire time from the flier. I was about three quarters around when I saw movement in the paddock. Not a thoat, a woman and an unusual one at that. Barsoomian Red Men have a coppery color to their skin and are universally black haired. This woman was white skinned with blonde hair and she backed against the wall and stared at me, fear in her eyes.
“Florina!” I called. “Come here please! And hurry!”
It was only a moment before she arrived and froze at the sight. The woman had breasts! Not the small A or B-cup of the normal Barsoomian woman but something larger and fuller that would need a bra on Earth but firmed up nicely under the lighter gravity of Mars. Instead of the usual leather straps to form a harness, she wore a light chain around her waist that was held up only by her hips which were broad and shapely. She had a piece of pink silk about eight inches wide that hung almost to her knees in front, then slipped over the chain, ran between her legs to afford modesty then I assumed repeated the design in back. The effect was a sort of breech-cloth that the Red Indians of America wore, only much more attractive and leaving her legs and hips bare. She also wore a pink robe and hood that fell to her ankles and covered her back and with sleeves to hold her arms. It would have covered her body had she tied it closed, but the thing was open and resembled more a cape than anything else and as sheer as it was, the gown hid nothing.
She also had a bandage attached to her upper right thigh and another over her heart which was much lower and more centered than a human heart so the bandage was centered beneath and between her breasts as if someone had tried to stab her through that organ. She also wore the usual Red Woman’s taste in lots of jewelry from bracelets to necklaces to rings from every limb. And she was barefoot, another unusual fashion.
“I mean you no harm,” I said, keeping my hands away from my weapons.
She replied in a language I couldn’t understand and as every Barsoomian speaks the same tongue, I assumed that she was an alien visitor as was I. So I tried Gaelic, then English, Japanese, Arabic and the Spanglic the Mon spoke in Demon Space to no avail. She replied in her tongue again so I told Florina, “Keep watch with her while I finish my search.” Then I left them together and finished my cursory search to reveal no one else.
I called Florina, “Bring her to the Dwar’s office and we’ll see what we can learn.”
My lover arrived with the girl and said to me, “I think she is a Holy Thern. They are pale-skinned as are you and have yellow hair and are supposed to speak another language. But they live in the Valley Dor so what would one be doing here?”
I didn’t know but I set three glasses on the desk and poured wine into each. The blonde took hers and drank it in one gulp then held it out for more. This glass she drank slower and was sipping her third with no effects of drunkenness as we two were still drinking our first. I found some sealed field rations and she ate through those as if she were starving. “A Thern, here, starving and alone and unable to speak our language. This is a mystery indeed.”
Noticing that her bandages were dirty, Florina brought a medical kit from a cabinet she had been searching and offered to change her dressings. The woman ignored her completely as if she didn’t exist so my slave pushed the kit to me. I asked, “Lady, your dressings need change, please allow me to assist if you won’t allow my slave to help you.” She immediately covered the wounds with her hands and backed away. When I motioned the kit, she took it, turned away from us and changed her own dressings, not allowing us to see her wounds.
Well, people have strange customs so I accepted this and said, “I want to do a more careful search so please find her a place to rest and begin teaching her our language as you did me.”
My slave tried to motion the woman to follow her but received a look as if she were thoat dung so Florina backed away, bowed very low and apologized to her. The woman ignored her totally and instead followed me as I left. I tried to explain that she should follow Florina but she refused to consider such a thing and spoke in her own speech then waited for me to led. As I did so, she followed and I spoke to Florina, “I guess she won’t go with you so please unload the flier and we’ll take the Dwar’s quarters since they are the most comfortable-looking.”
She gave me a dirty look and whispered in my ear, “Strange that she was starving and dirty here where the food, water and medical supplies were so easy to find.” But she did as I said and so I continued my explorations, this time more carefully, examining every room. I knew that the fortress walls would be solid and this close to the Marshes the ground a few feet below would be too wet to dig so there would be no secret passages or pits. The walkway around the wall was the roof to these rooms so there was no attic or crawlspace either. What I saw would be what was there. What I really sought was some clue as to where the two garrisons had gone and why.
There were ghost ships on Earth that had been deserted by their crews and sometimes entire villages had vanished, one in Ireland had been taken by the fairies for some transgression or so they said but here? The barracks were deserted, their best weapons and harness gone but the extra gear remaining in place. Silks and furs lay neatly on their beds, their personal belongings undisturbed, those of the first garrison packed away. I found no trace of blood, no sign of struggle, no bullet holes or sword nicks in wall or furniture. It was as if the Dwar had told everyone to prepare for a short patrol, rode out and never returned. The only sign of violence was the two bandages on the blonde woman who followed me every place I searched, never being more than a meter away from me. Her scent and appearance was intoxicating and ….
I knew I was missing something but I couldn’t see what. Food was in abundance in the galley. The well was clean, the water-purifier was working and there was more clean water in this fortress than in many cities. Swords and daggers hung from the walls or were stored away. Personal belongings and even the oval coins they used for money remained. Just no people and no thoats or fliers.
We were sitting for lunch when Florina whispered to me, “Will you please stop staring at her chest. I know they are obscenely huge and I don’t see how she walks with them but your constant looks make me feel so inadequate.”
“She looks normal by my world’s standards with many a woman far larger.”
“And I suppose you find her pale skin and yellow hair to your liking also?” she said.
“She is the ideal of beauty on my world.” I said. Florina then slammed the tray she was holding on the table and stalked out. Only then did I realize what stupidity I had done. My mother once told me, “Jason, when your wife asks you if she looks fat, lie! If she asks if you look at other women, lie. If she asks if you slept with someone else, lie! Go to your grave with a lie on your lips because that will be preferable to the misery your wife will cause you for telling the truth.” Florina was beautiful but by Earth’s standards, she was flat-chested and I missed breasts. I started to rise to apologize to her but the blonde took my arm, smiled and motioned for me to sit. She chattered away in her language, not caring that I couldn’t understand her words but more comfortable now that we were alone.
I tried to teach her some words but she ignored my efforts completely as if they were unimportant so we finished the meal with her completely comfortable with my staring at her. And for the first time on this planet, I found someone who accepted my alien appearance as natural. She looked at me as if I were a normal man, not an alien freak. When done eating, I took her to a guest room and indicated that she was to sleep there and then I returned to the wall where I used the powerful Barsoomian field glasses to scan the outside areas seeking clues to my next search. Still nothing. There was a fire zone cleared of all but moss and in the distance to the south I was the Marshes begin. All around the fort, at a safe distance, I saw small copses of mantilla and other flora but none large enough to hide more than a single man. On Earth any vegetation within rifle range would be bulldozed for security but here, with a radium rifle’s effective range being far greater than any earthly weapon, the Red Men considered vegetation more important than a sniper’s cover.
I left the fort and searched for thoat tracks to indicate the direction the garrison had gone but found nothing in the moss. Thoats are toed like camels and so leave no tracks as would a horse. I searched the surrounding area for hours and saw nothing save an occasional silian seeking prey far from the waters of the marsh and some ancient walls that had been uncovered by recent digging. Unlike the dead cities that dot the planet, these were in ruin and were little more than a part of a wall and a square hole, lined with stone that could have been anything from a grave to a storage room to an entrance to the pits.
I returned to the fort just before sunset and found the blonde awaiting me at the gate but Florina nowhere to be found. In panic I ran inside and called her name out. She ran from the galley crying, “What’s wrong?” then saw the blonde and immediately her mood turned. “I can see all is well with you so I shall return to my duties scrubbing pans for my master and his guest.” Then she turned and walked away swinging her hips in an exaggerated motion. I had no idea of what to do until the blonde took my arm and led me to the office where she bade me sit and helped me remove my weapons which she hung on the wall. Somehow her touch inflamed my senses and I fear I might have taken advantage of her had Florina not entered just then with dinner.
My slave looked at me, then at the blonde, then set the food down, bowed to us both and left without a word. I found this unusual but I was still getting used to Barsoomian customs and perhaps there was something about not eating in the presence of a Thern I didn’t know. We had never talked about religion and the people of Toonol are atheists which was the only reason they were at war with Phundahl which worshipped Tur. I was more agnostic and less religious coming from a Catholic family that gave half it’s income and half it’s children to the Church and killed the English more because they were Protestant than because of their nationality. So I didn’t know if Florina followed some religion from Amhor that I didn’t know about for normally, when in public, she would stand behind me to serve me as I needed. I knew that the Therns used to be looked upon as Gods but that was some two hundred years ago.
Drat! Florina was 245 years old. She had spent the first 45 years of her life worshipping the Therns. And even after John Carter proved the falsehood of their religion, many still refused to accept and continued as they had for a million years. The Blonde was, to Florina, as if the Pope would visit my homeland or even England. No wonder she was acting so strangely. She, a slave, felt herself inadequate to be in the presence of such an important person.
We ate in as strange a conversation as I can remember. The Blonde chatted in her own language, not caring that I was ignorant of her words. I talked about my day and my observations expecting Florina to make some sense of them but all I could do was talk to someone who, beautiful as she was, left the conversation totally empty as if I had eaten a meal of sand. Not distasteful, just full but somehow still hungry. The woman was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen and she accepted me as I was and gave me fantasies I didn’t understand but still I wished Florina had been here to listen to me talk and offer ideas.
I was tired after my day so I escorted the blonde to her room and returned to mine where I found Florina making my bed and arranging our furs and silks for the night. I reached for her but she pushed me away, “Tonight I need to sleep alone.”
“Have you been crying?” I asked. “Your eyes are red and puffy.”
“It’s the dust.” She explained. “Goodnight. I shall see you in the morning,” and she ran from my room without another word. I had no idea of what to do so removed the remainder of my harness, attended to my toilet and crawled into bed to fall asleep immediately.
It was totally dark outside and inside with both moons below the horizon when she came to me. I felt her lips caress my cheek, her tongue in my ear and, excited I ran my hand up her side to cup a handful of breast. I felt her nipple harden under my touch then,….
I jumped from the bed and unhooded the radium lamp. It wasn’t Florina but the blonde woman, naked save the bandages. She smiled and entered my bed. It was the fullness of her breast that gave her away for Florina had little to obstruct my wandering hands. “What are you doing here?” I demanded. In my entire life I had been with but three women and wasn’t used to this behaviour in a female.
She chatted away, making it clear that she wished to stay with me but I stammered, “I’d like to but. I care for another. I really can’t do this. You have to go now. Florina..” I held my furs around myself and avoided her touch as I opened my door and motioned her outside. She picked up her gauze outfit and then, caressing my cheek with her hand, left. I saw Florina across the way and she immediately ran inside and slammed the door to her room. I don’t understand women and I wished that either the doors had bolts on them or that it had been Florina there tonight.
I shoved a chair against the door and returned to bed, trying to think but still feeling her breast under my hand. It was a long sleepless night.
I awoke late with a knock at my door. I held some furs before me and peeked out to find my lover outside holding a tray of breakfast so I removed the chair and opened the door for her to enter. The dust must have been very thick because she looked as if she had been crying all night. Strange, I wasn’t sneezing as much as I normally do but sometimes people react differently.
She set the meal on the desk as I dressed and sat then I said, “Last night…” She interrupted me with fingers over my mouth, “My Lord, my master, I am your slave to serve you in any way you wish. I cannot marry you or be with you in public so, … please be silent and let me finish while I can. Last night was your right. I have nothing to say about how you live. When you wish me, call and I will serve you but if you wish the Holy Thern, then please care not for my thoughts.” She never looked into my eyes the entire time.
“But my love, I don’t want…” she shussed me again. “Please my master, let us not speak of this. Just do as you will.”
Women! I took a bite and said, “I don’t think she is a Thern. Didn’t I read somewhere that Therns are bald? Then shouldn’t she be wearing a wig? Last night before I made her leave, she was naked and unless Therns wear very well-made wigs down there and her wigs are glued on, her hair is natural. She moves like a Barsoomian so she isn’t from Jasoom or any other larger world but she’s built like a Jasoomian. So who is she and why is she here? Why doesn’t she speak your language? Why is she built like a human? How did she get wounded and why won’t her wounds heal despite your medical ointments? I’m beginning to wonder if her being here is related to the missing garrison.”
Florina looked at me and asked, “You don’t want her?”
“I thought I did until I threw her out of my room last night. In the dark I thought she was you but then I knew she wasn’t and stopped. But what about my questions?” I asked until she threw herself into my arms, kissing me as she undid my harness. “I thought you and she…. But you didn’t… you do love me…” It was a while before I could convince her to stop kissing me long enough to talk to me and I don’t think she heard me say, “How could you think that of me?” through her cries.
We lay there on the floor, her kissing my ears and neck when the blonde walked in and saw us. Honestly, I don’t know if she had just entered or saw the entire incident but when she saw me looking at her, she snarled, turned and left. Florina turned long enough to see her leave and smiled. “My loving master, you must get dressed for the day. We still have a mystery to solve.” And she pulled herself off of me and instead of fetching cleaning cloths, handed me my harness saying, “I think you should smell like me today.”
As I was dressing she asked, “Where is your revolver? I can find your swords and knife but your holster is empty.”
“My revolver? That’s what I’ve been missing! There are no firearms here. The cannon are missing from the towers and there are blades all over but no firearms. The only person who has been here is you and me and her. Check the flier!” I ordered.
I did another search of my room when I heard Florina scream. I quickly ran outside with drawn steel and saw the blonde easily holding her by the arm with one hand. Florina’s fingers were entangled in her blonde tresses but it was clear that the hair was natural and would not come off. Florina was bleeding from her nose where she had been struck and the blonde lifted her easily and licked the blood from Florina’s face. In the struggle the bandages had fallen away from the blonde and I saw a sword wound under her breast as if she had been stabbed to death. Her thigh had a circle and X carved into it, still bleeding as was her breast wound, both of which she ignored. She motioned to me and called for me ignoring my drawn sword when I saw Florina pull her dagger and drive it into the woman’s belly.
The woman flung my slave across the field with a strength that only an Earthman would have then she pulled the knife from her belly as if she were flicking some dirt away. The wound healed instantly as she dropped the knife and came to me, still beckoning to me, still naked save her open robe. The closer she came, the more I wanted her and I knew that if she touched me, I’d be powerless to resist so I did what I could, I cried, “Flier” to Florina and backed away to give my love a chance to escape. Then I reached for my revolver. It was still missing. Obviously, this woman was immune to steel but radium bullets scared her so she had removed them all, revealing herself only when she was safe from harm.
I backed away from her slowly then turned and leapt for the roof, a simple feat for my earthly muscles but she would have to move to the ramps to follow. She didn’t, she leapt to the roof with the same strength that I possessed. I immediately turned and jumped the wall, the twenty foot drop to the outside meaning nothing to my earthly muscles. Then I ran away taking bounds of easily fifteen to twenty feet at a time. Stupidly, I turned to look back and tripped. She was running after me faster than I could imagine, her breasts bouncing and hair flowing behind as she approached until a rope struck me in the head. “Grab it you fool!” I heard Florina call and as I did so, she rose the flier high into the sky with me dangling below.
Climbing the mooring rope was easy when you have thumbs on either side of your hand, thumbs on your feet and a prehensile tail and within a moment I was over the side next to my love whose face I covered with kisses.
When we finally slowed and turned, we saw the woman walking back to the fort. “Is the rifle still here?” I asked.
“No, gone with all the ammunition. She was very careful about that. Orovars are quite intelligent and plan well.”
“Orovars?” I asked. “They vanished 400,000 years ago. I know you are a long-lived race but even that’s stretching it a bit.”
“She’s not alive. She’s a corphal, an evil spirit who took the body of the lowest of criminals. That sign carved into her thigh shows what she is. It was carved there just before the Jeddak killed her for only a Jed or Jeddak can safely kill a corphal. That body must have been buried there under or near the fort for a half million years. The ancients had ways of preserving the dead we can only imagine. Then the corphal awoke and using her female wiles, had the men of the garrison kill each other. She then ate the bodies down to the smallest drop of blood.” Florina explained. “She wanted you too and had you not repulsed her, you’d be in her belly also. It was only fear of your radium revolver that kept her docile.”
“How did you figure this out?” I asked.
“Not everyone gave up the Religion of Issus after John Carter returned from Dor. Some of us believed he made up that story to avoid being killed as a heretic. Corphals are a big part of our faith and we have many stories of them. When I realized that she wasn’t bald, or an alien like you, I listened very carefully to her speech and recognized many words, changed over time. I knew then she was an Orovar and the only thing she could be was a corphal. Seeing the carving on her leg proved it.” She explained. “She attacked me as I pulled the bandage off.”
“Are you certain that only a Jeddak can kill her? She was afraid of the rifles.” I asked.
“So the stories say.”
“Land me in the fort.” I commanded. “This is NOT a request but an order from a master to his slave!” I added as she hesitated.
Once inside she approached me, inviting, desirable. I drew my long-sword and called to her, “I am Jason Obrien, Jed of Innis. My grandfather was Jeddak of Munster, my great grandfather was Jeddak of Eire. I have the blood of Kings flowing through my veins and this blood condemns you to DEATH!” and I thrust my blade through her heart, striking the same scar as did her first executioner. Then as she screamed and fell to her knees, grasping my sword and trying to putt it free. I wrapped my tail around her arms to prevent that and drawing my short-sword and pulling her hair with my free hand, I cut with all my strength. Her head came free and I flung the thing as far over the wall as I could. Her body fell to the ground and a part of me noticed that there was very little blood soaking INTO the ground from her severed neck.
Florina landed the flier and took my hand as we watched her age into dust until naught was left but my steel on the ground.
“You are a Jeddak?” she asked.
“No, but my ancestors are and I am in line for the Throne of Ireland.” I took her to my room and added, “Of course half the island can say that and you’d have to kill off a million people closer to me before I could ascend the throne but she didn’t know that. It’s a matter of conviction. Come, my love, I’d like to pack up and return home today. Our bed is more comfortable than this one and I need a bath.”
END
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by: Rick Johnson
PO Box 40451
Tucson, Az.
85717
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