"Guardsmen," I said, drawing my sword.
Suddenly I saw the shields shift, facing us obliquely, and saw the right arms raise, spears high, with no change in the rapid pace of the men. In another dozen steps the six spears would fly hurled from that swift even pace.
Losing not a moment I thrust my sword into my belt and seized Lara by the waist. As she protested I turned and forced her to run at my side. "Wait!" she pleaded. "I will speak to them!"
I swept her to my arms and ran.
No sooner had we reached the spiraling stone stairwell which led down from the wall than the six spears, their points describing a circle of perhaps a yard in diameter, struck the wall over our head with a splintering of rock. Once we reached the bottom of the wall we kept close to its base so as not to afford a target for further spear play. On the other hand I did not believe the guardsmen would cast their weapons from the wall. If they missed, or if they did not, it would necessitate descending from the wall to retrieve the weapons. It was unlikely a small party like that above would freely lose the height of the wall to pursue two rebels. _
We began to work our tortuous way through the grim, bloodstained streets of Tharna. Some of the buildings had been destroyed. Shops had been boarded up. Litter was everywhere. Rubbish burned in the gutters. Largely the streets were deserted save that here and there lay a body, sometimes that of a warrior of Tharna, more often one of its grey-clad citizens. On many of the walls the legend "Sa" ng- Fori" could be read.
On occasion terrified eyes scrutinised us fearfully from behind the shutters of windows. I suspected there was not a door in Tharna but was not barred that day.
"Halt!" cried a voice, and we stopped.
From in front of us and behind us a group of men had seemed to materialise. Several of them held crossbows; at least four others had spears poised; some boasted swords; but many of them carried nothing more than a chain or a sharpened pole.
"Rebels!" said Lara.
"Yes," I said.
We could read the sullen defiance, the resolve, the capacity to kill in those eyes, bloodshot with loss of sleep, the desperate carriage of those grey-clad bodies, hungry and vicious with the strain of street fighting. There were wolves in the streets of Tharna.
I slowly drew my sword, and thrust the girl to the side of the street against the wall.
One of the men laughed.
I too smiled for resistance was useless, yet I knew that I would resist, that I would not be disarmed until I lay dead on the stones of the street. What of Lara?
What would be her fate at the hands of this pack of maddened, desperate men? I regarded my ragged foes, some of whom had been wounded. They were filthy, savage, exhausted, angry, perhaps starving. She would probably be slain against the wall by which she stood. It would be brutal but quick, on the whole merciful.
The spear arms drew back, the crossbows leveled. Chains were grasped more firmly; the few swords lifted toward me; even the sharpened poles inclined toward my breast. "Tarl of Ko-ro-ba!" cried a voice, and I saw a small man, thin with a wisp of sandy hair across his forehead, press through the ragged band of rebels that confronted us.
It was he who had been first on the chain in the mines, he who had of necessity been first to climb the shaft from the slave kennel to freedom. His face was transfigured with joy and he rushed forward and embraced me. "This is he!" the man cried. "Tarl of Ko-ro-ba!"
At this point, to my wonder, the ragged band lifted their weapons and uttered a wild cheer. I was swept from my feet and thrown to their shoulders. I was carried through the streets and others of the rebels, appearing from doorways and windows, almost from the very stones of the street, joined what turned into a procession of triumph.
The voices of these haaggard but transformed men began to sing. I recognised the tune. It was a ploughing song I had first heard from the peasant in the mines. It had become the anthem of the revolution. Lara, as mystified as I, ran along with the men, staying as close to me as the jostling crowds permitted.
Thus borne aloft, from street to street, in the midst of joyous shouting, wepaons raised on all sides in salute, my ears ringing with the ploughing song, once a song of the freeholds of Tharna, long since supplanted by the Great Farms, I found myself brought to that fateful Kal-da shop I remembered so well, where I had dined in Tharna and had awakened to the treachery of Ost. It had become a headquarters of the revolution, perhaps because men of Tharna recalled that it was there they had learned to sing. There, standing before the low doorway, I looked once more upon the squat, powerful figure of Kron, of the Caste of Metal Workers. His great hammer was slung from his belt and his blue eyes glistened with happiness. The huge, scarred hands of a metal worker were held out to me.
Beside him, to my joy, I saw the impudent features of Andreas, that sweep of black hair almost obliterating his forehead. Behind Andreas, in the dress of a free woman, unveiled, her throat no longer encircled by the collar of a state slave, I saw the breathless, radiant Linna of Tharna. Andreas bounded past the men at the door and rushed to me. He seized me by the hands and dragged me to the street, roughly grappling my shoulders and laughing with joy.
"Welcome to Tharna!" said he. "Welcome to Tharna!"
"Yes," said Kron, only a step behind him, seizing my arm. "Welcome to Tharna."
Chapter Twenty-Four: THE BARRICADE
I ducked my head and shoved open the heavy wooden door of the Kal-da shop. The sign KAL-DA SOLD HERE had been repainted in bright letters. Also, smeared across the letters, written with a finger, was the defiant rallying call of the rebellion — "Sa'ng-Fori".
I descended the low, wide steps to the interior. This time the shop was crowded. It was hard to see where to step. It was wild and noisy. It might have been a Paga Tavern of Ko- ro-ba or Ar, not a simple Kal-da shop of Tharna. My ears were assailed by the din, the jovial uproar of men no longer afraid to laugh or shout.
The shop itself was now hung with perhaps half a hundred lamps and the walls were bright with the caste colours of the men who drank there. Thick rugs had been thrown under the low tables and were stained in innumerable places with spilled Kal-da.
Behind the counter the thin, bald-headed proprietor, his forehead glistening, his slick black apron stained with spices, juices and wine, busily worked his long mixing paddle in a vast pot of bubbling Kal-da. My nose wrinkled. There was no mistaking the smell of brewing Kal-da. From behind three or four of the low tables, to the left of the counter, a band of sweating musicians sat happily cross- legged on the rug, somehow producing from those unlikely pipes and strings and drums and disks and wires the ever intriguing, wild, enchanting — beautiful — barbaric melodies of Gor.
I wondered at this for the Caste of Musicians had been, like the Caste of Poets, exiled from Tharna. Theirs, like the Caste of Poets, had been a caste regarded by the sobre masks of Tharna as not belonging in a city of serious and dedicated folk, for music, like Paga and song, can set men" s hearts aflame and when men" s hearts are aflame it is not easy to know where the flame may spread.
As I entered the room the men rose to their feet and shouted and lifted their cups in salute.
Almost as one they cried out, "Tal, Warrior!"