Kur of Gor (32 page)

The hunting sleen growled at the wild sleen.

This growl was returned by the wild sleen, whose ribs could be seen within its snarled, matted fur.

It is starving, thought Cabot.

It will not be warned away.

The hunting sleen then rushed upon its wild fellow, and, in moments, after a brief, squealing, exploding, rolling, tangled bunching of fur, the wild sleen lay, eyes glazed, limp in the dirt, its throat still throbbing, discharging blood into the dirt.

It was at this point that the larl advanced.

It was waiting, I see it now, thought Cabot, for there to be but a single foe, and one perhaps exhausted, or weakened, from an earlier contest.

The meat will now be all his.

The larl did not understand of course the menace of the power weapons, and their scope, so unlike single arrows, weapons which might have transformed him in a moment into a little more than a mound of burned meat, like a small mountain, smoking and bubbling, beneath a descending, gentle scattering of drifting, burning hair.

But the machine stood between the winnings of the sleen and he who would lay claim upon them.

The sleen was now burrowing his muzzle into the body of the wild sleen, chewing out the organ meat, delicacies most prized amongst carnivores.

The larl, no more than the sleen, reacted to the machine as a living thing, no more than it might have to a rock or tree.

But the mouth of the machine, and its fangs, raked the flank of the larl as it tried to brush past.

The larl snarled with rage, and turned, and licked at its bloodied flank, and then tried to pass, again.

Again, it was torn.

The larl tried to strike the object from its path with its paw, and there was a raking, scraping sound, but it might as well have struck against a wall of iron, and there was, as a consequence of the blow, which might have struck a man yards from its path, almost no movement in the machine.

The larl, irritated, puzzled, put its muzzle closer to the machine, trying to fathom its nature, and the mouth of the machine, very gently, opened, and took the throat of the larl in its metal jaws. The larl did not understand this, for it sensed nothing alive, but then its eyes widened, and it tried to pull its neck free, but the jaws very gently, continued to close, as might have an electronic vice. Then the larl pulled and snarled, and then blood spurted from its nostrils, and then, as it twisted, ever more weakly, its head was bitten away.

Cabot noted that the Kur who had been attacked by the sleen now lay quietly to the side. The body would be left for the beasts of the forest. This, in such situations, is regarded as cultural. In this way, in Kur belief, one is reconciled with, and returned to, that nature which has spawned one. The gift of life is a loan, as the Kur commonly sees it, a loan for which one is grateful, a loan which, when due, is to be willingly repaid with the coin of death.

The machine seemed to lift its head, and turn it in one direction, and then its head, on the mechanical neck, rotated to another direction, opposite.

"There were only eight, and two sleen,” said one of the Kurii.

"One sleen remains,” said another.

Then the machine lifted its head, further, and Cabot knew himself discerned.

"You know me?” inquired the machine.

"I think so,” said Cabot.

"Are you well?” inquired the machine.

"Yes,” said Cabot.

Something was said to one of the Kurii, and it clambered upward, reached Cabot, and then lifted the net, with its prisoner, Cabot, and carried it down the slope to the level. It placed the net and Cabot at the paws of the machine, which towered above him.

"Close your eyes,” said the machine, and Cabot obeyed. Even through his closed lids Cabot could sense the blast of light and heat, moving about him. Then it was shut off and Cabot opened his eyes, and stood up, unsteadily, free, the severed, burned shreds of the net about his feet.

Cabot looked up. The head of the machine, as it sat, like a larl, was several feet above his head.

"It was doubtless with this that the sleen were set upon him,” said a Kur, lifting Cabot's tunic, taken from a pouch attached to the harness of one of the fallen hunters.

"Let us see,” said the machine.

The Kur who held the wadded tunic threw it before the feeding sleen, who looked upon it, and then crawled toward it, and then, suddenly, as though recovering from some distraction, perhaps its experiences at the ledge, its attack on the Kur, its fight with its wild fellow, the satisfying of its hunger, looked at Cabot, and snarled. Cabot crouched down. He did not have even his pointed stick with which to defend himself. The tail of the sleen began to lash. It gathered its four hind feet beneath it. It growled.

"It is going to attack,” came from one of the translators.

"I will attack,” came dispassionately from the machine.

There was a flash of metal plating and joints as the device leapt past Cabot, pouncing on the startled, suddenly rearing sleen, its weight striking against it, then half crushing it, and then the machine, rising up slowly, pinned the sleen in place with its left forefoot and the right forefoot of the device began to descend, slowly, a timing reminiscent of the closure of its jaws on the throat of the larl, the sleen squirming beneath it, and Cabot heard a shriek of the animal, the splintering crack of its backbone, like the snapping of a stick, and then the rupture of ribs, one after the other, and then witnessed the flattening of the body, organs and lungs half protruded, as though disgorged, through the jaws.

The machine then, as Cabot backed away, went to the bodies of each of the hunters, and, taking the head of each in the massive metal jaws, bit it away. It went lastly to the largest of the hunters, he who had commanded the others, and he who had assured Cabot as to the lack of animosity resident in his dark mission, and bit off his head, as well.

The machine then, standing over the headless body of the large Kur, regarded Cabot.

"This,” it said, stirring the body with its broad, metal-clawed foot, “was Kalonicus, cousin to Pyrrhus."

Cabot nodded.

"Pyrrhus, enemy of the world,” said the machine.

"I would know little of that,” said Cabot.

The machine then took up the huge body of the Kur in its jaws, held it dangling for a moment, while looking about itself, and then it shook it as though it might have been no more than a handful of rags, shook it viciously, and then flung it away, until it struck against trees, and fell to their feet, better than a hundred paces far.

The machine then turned to the Kurii about, and sat back on its metal haunches, catlike, blood on the steel of its jaws, its head up.

"Hail Agamemnon, Eleventh Face of the Nameless One, Theocrat of the World,” came from a translator, and the Kurii knelt, each on a single knee.

Cabot did not kneel.

One of the Kurii noticed this and growled.

Cabot did not kneel.

The Kur raised his power weapon.

"How is Tarl Cabot, my friend?” came from the machine.

The Kur lowered his power weapon. He then, and the others, at a nod from the great machine, rose to their hind feet.

"I am well, Lord Agamemnon,” said Cabot.

"How is it,” inquired the machine, “that you came to the sport world?"

"May I ask,” said Cabot, “how is it that you came hence?"

The machine was silent.

One of the Kurii growled, softly.

"It is to your timely intervention that I doubtless owe my life,” said Cabot. “I am grateful. It seems I was mistook as a prey human by noble hunters."

"That would have been tragic,” said the machine.

"A lamentable misunderstanding,” said Cabot.

"We came to the forest,” said the machine, “upon being apprised of your possible danger by Peisistratus, human."

"Then I must be grateful to him, as well."

"Lord Pyrrhus, it seems,” said the machine, “erred in taking a human into his confidence."

"I fear I fail to understand,” said Cabot.

"Do you think it is wise to trust a human?” asked the machine.

"It is hard to tell,” said Cabot. “Much might depend upon the human."

"He was betrayed by Peisistratus,” said the machine. “He thought Peisistratus was his human."

"I see,” said Cabot.

"But he is my human."

"I see,” said Cabot.

"So how came you here, my friend?” asked the machine.

"I was curious,” said Cabot. “I wandered off. It was unwise of me."

"I see,” said the machine.

"How is Lord Pyrrhus?” asked Cabot.

"He has been deprived of his rank, his goods, and chattels,” said the machine. “He is in chains. You need no longer fear him."

"I know little of these matters,” said Cabot.

"We will expect you to be present, and testify, at his trial, his trail for high treason."

"He will receive a trial?” said Cabot.

"Certainly,” said the machine. “Do you think we are barbarians?"

Cabot looked about, at the sleen, the larl, the blood-soaked ground, the headless bodies. “Certainly not,” he said.

"Lord Pyrrhus is not above the law,” said the machine.

"No one is above the law,” speculated Cabot.

"No,” said the machine. “One is above the law."

"And who might that one be?” asked Cabot.

"I am he,” said the machine.

"I understand,” said Cabot.

Chapter, the Twentieth:

THE TRIAL

Cabot was well bedecked, in purple robes, sashed with gold. About this neck were strings of rubies.

He refused a diadem of gold, as he felt himself no ruler, no king, no baron, no Ubar, no Administrator, or such.

Peisistratus, too in splendid robes, stood near him, on a step below the surface of the platform of the witness. This platform was twelve feet high, and railed, and stout enough to support more than one Kur. The jury was a thousand Kurii, ranged on tiers. Lord Pyrrhus, chained by limbs and neck, and fastened in a cement pit, had spoken in his own defense, but his defense, articulate and bellicose, did little more than confirm his guilt. He did protest his innocence of treason, and his insistence that he had never acted otherwise than in the best interests of the species and the world.

The testimony of Peisistratus, taken through translators, had made it clear that Lord Pyrrhus had intended to take the human, Tarl Cabot, hunting in the sport cylinder, which seemed upon the surface, if tasteless considering some of the game available, at least sufficiently innocent. Other testimony had made it clear that Lord Pyrrhus had returned from the sport cylinder without Tarl Cabot, and that, later, a hunting party of eight Kurii, three of whom were womb brothers, and two of whom were egg brothers, to Lord Pyrrhus had entered the sport world with sleen, and had been arrested in the midst of an attempt upon the life of Tarl Cabot, esteemed ally of Agamemnon.

"You are the human, Tarl Cabot?” inquired the translator of the chief prosecutor.

"I am,” said Cabot.

"One supposes it is possible,” said the prosecutor, “that a terrible mistake is involved in all this, for the defendant is Kur."

"Certainly,” said Cabot.

"Yet it seems clear, and overwhelmingly so, that Lord Pyrrhus had designs upon your life."

"What reason could he possibly have for such designs?” asked Cabot.

"That question is to be ignored,” said the judge, who was not visible, but whose presence was made known by a sound system, and whose words were picked up by the platform translator, set in the railing before Cabot. The body of Agamemnon, in this instance, Cabot supposed, was in effect the courtroom itself. He had little doubt that Agamemnon, wherever he might be ensconced, could see as well as hear the proceedings.

"We need not inquire into such matters,” said the chief prosecutor, “as facts are at issue, and not motivations."

"Very well,” said Cabot.

"One fact is clear, at least,” said the prosecutor, “that a tunic, bestowed upon you in accordance with the largesse of Lord Agamemnon, Eleventh Face of the Nameless One, Theocrat of the World, was in the possession of the hunting party by which you were endangered, a tunic used to set sleen upon you."

"Certainly to find me,” said Cabot.

"I do not understand,” said the prosecutor.

"Perhaps the party was sent by Lord Pyrrhus, or someone, to locate me in the sport world, and thereby effect my rescue."

"We have ample testimony,” said the prosecutor, whose movements suggested anger, though the translator spoke without passion, “that in the time of your location your life was in great jeopardy."

"That is true,” said Cabot. “I fear the hunters mistook me for a game human."

"How could that be?” inquired the prosecutor.

"I fear I was clad in skins, suggesting a human game animal,” said Cabot.

Several of the encircling jurors exchanged glances.

"Lord Pyrrhus took you to the sport cylinder and abandoned you there, to be hunted down and killed by his cohorts,” said the prosecutor.

"Is that not speculation?” asked Cabot.

"It is fact,” said the prosecutor.

"One supposes the jury must decide on that,” said Cabot.

"Are you intent on trying to protect one who would have had you slain?"

"Is that not for the jury to ponder?” inquired Cabot.

"You could not have reached the sport cylinder alone,” said the prosecutor. “You could not know the shuttle codes."

"I was to go hunting with Lord Pyrrhus,” said Cabot. “I had codes from him, though I do not now recall them. I was to wait for him, but I went ahead. Perhaps he came later to the shuttle port, and deemed that I had declined the hunt, and thus returned to his quarters."

"What are you telling us?” asked the prosecutor.

"I was curious,” said Cabot. “I wandered off. It was unwise of me."

"You would hold Lord Pyrrhus innocent in all this?” said the prosecutor.

"Certainly,” said Cabot.

Pyrrhus, clothed in chains, in the pit, regarded Cabot, puzzled.

"What are you doing?” whispered Peisistratus to Cabot.