Scarcely had Hassan and I, clad in the garments of guards, astride kaiila taken from the stables of Tarna’s kasbah, emerged from the fortress’s gate than, on the path to Red Rock, clouds of riders had swept before us. Wheeling our kaiila we had sought escape, only to discover we were surrounded. In the bright moonlight of Gor’s three moons we turned. On every side were riders, many with crossbows.
“We have been waiting for you,” said one of the riders. “Will it be necessary to kill the kaiila?” The riders were veiled in red.
“No,” had said Hassan. He had disarmed himself, and dismounted. I followed his example.
Ropes were put on our throat; our hands were tied behind our backs.
On foot, among our captors, tethered by the neck to saddle rings, bound, we trudged to the larger of the pair of kasbahs, that other than Tarna’s. The journey was not long, only some two pasangs.
At the foot of the great gate we stopped. The walls were more than seventy feet high. The battlements, square and looming, of which there were seventeen, assuming general symmetry and counting the two flanking the central gate, soared to ninety feet. The front wall was some four hundred feet in length; the side walls were some four hundred and fifty feet in length. The walls in such a kasbah are several feet thick, formed of stones and mud brick; the walls in this kasbah, as in most, too, were covered with a sheen of plaster, whitish pink, which, in the years of exposure to the heat and sun, as is common, had flaked abundantly.
“You are Tarl Cabot,” said the leader of the men who had captured us, indicating me.
I shrugged. Hassan looked at me.
“And you,” said the man, indicating Hassan, “are Hassan, the bandit.”
“It is possible,” admitted Hassan.
“It is as naked prisoners that you will enter this kasbah,” said the man.
We were stripped by the scimitar.
Naked, bound, standing in the sand, tethered, surrounded by kaiila, and riders, we looked up at the lofty walls of flaking plaster, the battlements flanking the great gate. The moonlight reflected from the walls of pinkish, flaking plaster.
Two of the kaiila snorted, pawing the sand.
The great gate, on its heavy hinges, opening in the middle, slowly swung back.
We faced the opening.
“You two have been troublesome,” said the rider. “You will be troublesome no more.”
We could see the whitish courtyard, its sand, beyond the gate, lamps set in walls.
“Whose kasbah is this?” I asked.
“It can be only,” said Hassan, “the kasbah of the Guard of the Dunes.”
“That of the Salt Ubar?” I asked.
“That,” agreed Hassan. I had heard of the Salt Ubar, or the Guard of the Dunes.
The location of his kasbah is secret. Probably, other than his own men, only some few hundred know of it, primarily merchants high in the salt trade, and few of them would know its exact location. Whereas salt may be obtained from sea water and by burning seaweed, as is sometimes done in Torvaldsland, and there are various districts on Gor where salt, solid or in solution, may be obtained, by far the most extensive and richest of known Gor’s salt deposits are to be found concentrated in the Tahari. Tahari salt accounts, in its varieties, I would suspect, for some twenty percent of the salt and salt-related products, such as medicines and antiseptics, preservatives, cleansers, bleaches, bottle glass, which contains soda ash, taken from salt, and tanning chemicals, used on known Gor. Salt is a trading commodity par excellence. There are areas on Gor where salt serves as a currency, being weighed and exchanged much as precious metals. The major protection and control of the Tahari salt, of course, lies in its remoteness, the salt districts, of which there are several, being scattered and isolated in the midst of the dune country, in the long caravan journeys required, and the difficulty or impossibility of obtaining it without knowing the trails, the ways of the desert. A lesser protection and control of the salt, though a not unformidable one, lies in the policing of the desert by the Salt Ubar, or the Guard of the Dunes. The support of the kasbah of the Salt Ubar comes from fees supplied by high salt merchants, the measure of which fees, of course, they include in their wholesale pricings to lesser distributors. The function of the kasbah of the Salt Ubar, thus, officially, is to administer and control the salt districts, on behalf of the Tahari salt merchants, primarily by regulating access to the districts, checking the papers and credentials of merchants, inspecting caravans, keeping records of the commerce, etc. For example, caravans between Red Rock, and certain other oases, and the salt districts, will travel under an escort of the Guard of the Dunes. Many salt caravans, incidentally, travel only between the districts and the local oases, while others travel between the local oases and the distant points, often culminating with Kasra or Tor. Some caravans, of course, journey through from the distant points to the salt districts, accepting the danger and inconvenience of trekking the dune country, but thereby avoiding the higher charges of picking up salt from the storehouses in the local oases. Even these caravans, of course, once in the dune country are accompanied by the men of the Guard of the Dunes.
The Guard of the Dunes, however, does not obtain the title of the Salt Ubar in virtue of his complacent magistracy of the salt districts, subservient to the Tahari merchants. There are those who say, and I do not doubt it true, that it is he, and not the merchants, who controls the salt of the Tahari. Nominally a sheriff of the Tahad merchants, he, ensconced in his kasbah, first among fierce warriors, elusive and unscrupulous, possesses a strangle bold on the salt of the Tahari, the vital commerce being ruled and regulated as he wills. He holds within his territories the right of law and execution. In the dunes he is Ubar and the merchants bow their heads to him. The Guard of the Dunes is one of the most dreaded and powerful men in the Tahari.
“Kneel, Slaves,” said the rider, the leader of the men who had captured us.
Hassan and I knelt.
“Kiss the sand before the gate of your master,” said the man.
Hassan and I pressed our lips to the sand before the great, open portal.
“On your feet, Slaves,” said the man. Hassan and I rose to our feet.
“You have been troublesome, Slaves,” said the man. “You will be troublesome no more.”
The gate stood open before us. We could see the courtyard, whitish beyond, the moonlight on its sand, the small lamps set in the far walls.
“Herd the slaves before their master,” said the rider, be the leader of our captors.
I felt the point of a scimitar in my back.
“What is the name of the Salt Ubar?” I asked Hassan.
“I thought everyone knew his name,” said Hassan.
“No,” I said. “What is his name?”
“Abdul,” said Hassan.
The scimitar pressed in my back. I, and Hassan, entered the kasbah of the Guard of the Dunes, the Salt Ubar, he whose name was Abdul.
Opulent were the halls and lofty chambers of the kasbah of Abdul, the guard of the dunes, he known as the Salt Ubar of the Tahari.
Rich and smooth were the variegated, glossy tiles, sumptuous the hangings, slender the pillars and columns, ornate the screens and carvings, brilliant and intricate the stylized floral inlays, the geometrical mosaics. High vessels of gold, some as tall as a girl, gleaming dully in the light of the lamps, were passed on our journey through the halls, into the upper rooms, too, great vases of red and yellow porcelain, many of which were as large as a man, imported from the potteries of Tyros. Beaded curtains did we pass, and many portals, looming and carved.