John Norman - Counter Earth04 - Nomads Of Gor Read online

  I passed fields that were burning, and burning huts of peasants, the smoking shells of Sa-Tarna granaries, the shattered, slatted coops for vulos, the broken walls of keeps for the small, long-haired domestic verr, less belligerent and sizeable than the wild verr of the Voltai Ranges.

  Then for the first time, against the horizon, a jagged line, humped and rolling like thundering waters, seemed to rise alive from the prairie, vast, extensive, a huge arc, churning and pounding from one corner of the sky to the other, the herds of the Wagon Peoples, encircling, raising dust into the sky like fire, like hoofed glaciers of fur and horn moving in shaggy floods across the grass, toward me.

  And then I saw the first of the outriders, moving toward me, swiftly yet not seeming to hurry. I saw the slender line of his light lance against the sky, strapped across his back.

  I could see he carried a small, round, leather shield, glossy, black, lacquered; he wore a conical, fur-rimmed iron helmet, a net of colored chains depending from the helmet protecting his face, leaving only holes for the eyes. He wore a quilted jacket and under this a leather jerkin; the jacket was trimmed with fur and had a fur collar; his boots were made of hide and also trimmed with fur; he had a wide, five-buckled belt. I could not see his face because of the net of chain that hung before it. I also noted, about his throat, now lowered, there was a soft leather wind scarf which might, when the helmet veil was lifted be drawn over the mouth and nose, against the wind and dust of his ride.

  He was very erect in the saddle. His lance remained on his back, but he carried in his right hand the small, powerful horn bow of the Wagon Peoples and attached to his saddle was a lacquered, narrow, rectangular quiver containing as many as forty arrows. On the saddle there also hung, on one side, a coiled rope of braided boskbide and, on the other, a long, three-weighted bole of the sort used in hunting tumits and men; in the saddle itself on the right side, indicating the rider must be right-handed, were the seven sheaths for the almost legendary quivas, the balanced saddleknives of the prairie. It was said a youth of the Wagon Peoples was taught the bow, the quiva and the lance before their parents would consent to give him a name, for names are precious among the Wagon Peoples, as among Goreans in general, and they are not to be wasted on someone who is likely to die, one who cannot well handle the weapons of the hunt and war.

  Until the youth has mastered the bow, the quiva and the lance he is simply known as the first, or the second, and so on, son of such and such a father.

  The Wagon Peoples war among themselves, but once in every two hands of years, there is a time of gathering of the peoples, and this, I had learned, was that time. In the thinking of the Wagon Peoples it is called the Omen Year, though the Omen Year is actually a season, rather than a year, which occupies a part of two of their regular years, for the Wagon Peoples calculate the year from the Season of Snows to the Season of Snows; Turians, incidentally, figure the year from summer solstice to summer solstice; Goreans generally, on the other hand, figure the year from vernal equinox to vernal equinox, their new year beginning, like nature's, with the spring; the Omen Year, or season, lasts several months, and consists of three phases, called the Passing of Turia, which takes place in the fad; the Wintering, which takes place north of Turia and commonly south of the Cartius, the equator of course lying to the north in this hemisphere; and the Return to Curia, in the spring, or, as the Wagon Peoples say, in the Season of Little Grass. It is near Turia, in the spring, that the Omen Year is completed, when the omens are taken usually over several days by hundreds of haruspexes, mostly readers of bask blood and verr livers, to determine if they are favorable for a choosing of a Ubar San, a One Ubar, a Ubar who would be High Ubar, a Ubar of an the Wagons, a Ubar of all the Peoples, one who could lead them as one people.*

  The omens, I understood, had not been favorable in more than a hundred years. I suspected that this might be due to the hostilities and bickerings of the peoples among themselves; where people did not wish to unite, where they relished their autonomy, where they nursed old grievances and sang the glories of vengeance raids, where they considered all others, even those of the other Peoples, as beneath themselves, there would not be likely to exist the conditions for serious confederation, a joining together of the wagons, as *A consequence of the chronological conventions of the Wagon Peoples, of course, is that their years tend to vary in length, but this fact, which might bother us, does not bother them, any more than the fact that some men and some animals live longer than others; the women of the Wagon Peoples, incidentally, keep a calendar based on the phases of Gor's largest moon, but this is a calendar of fifteen moons, named for the fifteen varieties of bask, and functions independently of the tallying of years by snows; for example, the Moon of the Brown Bosk may at one time occur in the winter, at another time, years later, in the summer; this calendar is kept by a set of colored pegs set in the sides of some wagons, on one of which, depending on the moon, a round, wooden plate bearing the image of a bosk is fixed. The years, incidentally, are not numbered by the Wagon Peoples, but given names, toward their end, based on something or other which has occurred to distinguish the year. The year names are kept in living memory by the Year Keepers, some of whom can recall the names of several thousand consecutive years. The Wagon Peoples do not trust important matters, such as year names, to paper or parchment, subject to theft, insect and rodent damage, deterioration, etc. Most of those of the Wagon Peoples have excellent memories, trained from birth. Few can read, though some can, perhaps having acquired the skill far from the wagons, perhaps from merchants or tradesmen. The Wagon Peoples, as might be expected, have a large and complex oral literature. This is kept by and occasionally, in parts, recited by the Camp Singers. They do not have castes, as Goreans tend to think of them. For example, every male of the Wagon Peoples is expected to be a warrior, to be able to ride, to be able to hunt, to care for the bask, and so on. When I speak of Year Keepers and Singers it 'muss be understood that these are not, for the Wagon Peoples, castes, but more like roles, subsidiary to their main functions, which are those of the war, herding and the hunt.

  They do have, however, certain clans, not castes, which specialize in certain matters, for example, the clan of healers, leather workers, salt hunters, and so on. I have already mentioned the clan of torturers.

  The members of these clans, however, like the Year Keepers and Singers, are all expected, first and foremost, to be, as it is said, of the wagons namely to follow, tend and protect the bask, to be superb in the saddle, and to be skilled with the weapons of both the hunt and war.

  The saying is; under such conditions it was not surprising that the 'omens tended to be unfavorable"; indeed, what more inauspicious omens could there be? The haruspexes, the readers of bosk blood and verr livers, surely would not be unaware of these, let us say, larger, graver omens. It would not, of course, be to the benefit of Turia, or the farther cities, or indeed, any of the free cities of even northern Gor, if the isolated fierce peoples of the south were to join behind a single standard and turn their herds northward, away from their dry plains to the lusher reaches of the valleys of the eastern Cartius, Perhaps even beyond them to those of the Vosk. Little would be safe if the Wagon Peoples should march.

  A thousand years ago it was said they had carried devastation as far as the walls of Ar and Ko-ro-ba. The rider had clearly seen me and was moving his mount steadily toward me.

  I could now see as well, though separated by hundreds of yards, three other riders approaching. One was circling to approach from the rear.

  The mount of the Wagon Peoples, unknown in the northern hemisphere of Gor, is the terrifying but beautiful kaiila. It is a silken, carnivorous, lofty creature, graceful, long-necked, smooth-gaited. It is viviparous and undoubtedly mammalian, though there is no suckling of the young. The young are born vicious and by instinct, as soon as they can struggle to their feet, they hunt. It is an instinct of the other, sensing the birth, to deliver the young animal in the vicinity of game. I supposed,
with the domesticated kaiila, a bound verr or a prisoner might be cast to the newborn animal. The kaiila, once it eats its fill, does not touch food for several days.

  The kaiila is extremely agile, and can easily outmaneuver he slower, more ponderous high tharlarion. It requires less food, of course, than the tarn. A kaiila, which normally stands about twenty to twenty-two hands at the shoulder, can over as much as six hundred pasangs in a single day's riding.*

  The head of the kaiila bears two large eyes, one on each side, but these eyes are triply lidded, probably an adaptation to the environment which occasionally is wracked by severe storms of wind and dust; the adaptation, actually a transparent third lid, permits the animal to move as it wishes under conditions that force other prairie animals to back into the wind or, like the sleen, to burrow into the ground. The kaiila is most dangerous under such conditions, and, as if it knew this, often uses such times for its hunt. Now the rider had reined in the kaiila. He held his ground, waiting for the others. I could hear the soft thud of a kaiila's paws in the grass, to my right.

  The second rider had halted there. He was dressed much as the first man, except that no chain depended from his helmet, but his wind scarf was wrapped about his face. His shield was lacquered yellow, and his bow was yellow. Over his shoulder he, too, carried one of the slender lances. He was a black. Kataii, I said to myself.

  The third rider placed himself, reining in suddenly, pulling the mount to its hind legs, and it reared snarling against the bit, and then stood still, its neck straining toward me. I could see the long, triangular tongue in the animal's head, behind the four rows of fangs. The rider, too, wore a wind scarf. His shield was red. The Blood People, the Kassars. I turned and was not surprised to see the fourth rider, motionless on his animal, already in position. The kaiila moves with great rapidity. The fourth rider was dressed in a hood and cape of white fur. He wore a flopping cap of white fur, which did not conceal the conical outlines of the steel beneath it. The leather of his jerkin was black. The buckles on his belt of gold. His lance had a rider hook under the point, with which he might dismount opponents.

  The kaiila of these men were as tawny as the brown grass of the prairie, save for that of the man who faced me, whose mount was a silken, sable black, as black as the lacquer of the shield.

  About the neck of the fourth rider there was a broad belt of jewels, as wide as my hand. I gathered that this was ostentation. Actually I was later to learn that the jeweled belt is worn to incite envy and accrue enemies; its purpose is to encourage attack, that the owner may try the skill of his weapons, that he need not tire himself seeking for foes. I knew, though, from the belt, though I first misread its purpose, that the owner was of the Paravaci, the Rich People "Tal!" I called, lifting my hand, palm inward, in Gorean greeting.

  As one man the four riders unstrapped their lances. "I am Tart Cabot," I called. "I come in peace" I saw the kaiila tense, almost like larls, their flanks quivering, their large eyes intent upon me. I saw one of the long, triangular tongues dart out and back. Their long ears were laid back against the fierce, silken heads. "Do you speak Gorean?" I called. As one, the lances were lowered. The lances of the Wagon Peoples are not pouched. They are carried in the right fist, easily, and are flexible and light, used for thrusting, not the battering-ram effect of the heavy lances of Europe's High Middle Ages. Needless to say, they can be almost as swift and delicate in their address as a saber. The lances are black, cut from the poles of young tem trees. They may be bent almost double, like finely tempered steel, before they break. A loose loop of boskhide, wound twice about the right fist, helps to retain the weapon in hand-to-hand combat. It is seldom thrown. "I come in peace!" I shouted to them. The man behind me called out, speaking Gorean with a harsh accent. "I am Tolnus of the Paravaci." Then he shook away his hood, letting his long hair stream behind him over the white fur of the collar. I stood stock still, seeing the face. From my left came a cry. "I am Conrad, he of the Kassars." He threw the chain mask from his face, back over the helmet and laughed. Were they of Earth stock, I asked myself. Were they men?

  From my right there came a great laugh. "I am Hakimba of the Kataii," he roared. He pulled aside the wind scarf with one hand, and his face, though black, bore the same marks as the others.

  Now the rider in front of me lifted the colored chains from his helmet, that I might see his face. It was a white face, but heavy, greased; the epicanthic fold of his eyes bespoke a mixed origin.

  I was looking on the faces of four men, warriors of the Wagon Peoples. On the face of each there were, almost like corded chevroes, brightly colored scars. The vivid coloring and intensity of these scars, their prominence, reminded me of the hideous markings on the faces of mandrills; but these disfigurements, as I soon recognized, were cultural not genetic. They bespoke not the natural innocence of the work of genes but the glories and status, the arrogance and prides, of their bearers. The scars had been worked into the faces, with needles and knives and pigments and the dung of basks over a period of days and nights. Men had died in the fixing of such scars. Most of the scars were set in pairs, moving diagonally down from the side of the head toward the nose and chin. The man facing me had seven such scars ceremonially worked into the tissue of his countenance, the highest being red, the next yellow, the next blue, the fourth black, then two yellow, then black again. The faces of the men I saw were all scarred differently, but each was scarred. The effect of the scars, ugly, startling, terrible, perhaps in part calculated to terrify enemies, had even prompted me, for a wild moment, to conjecture that what I faced on the Plains of Turia were not men, but perhaps aliens of some sort, brought to Gor long ago from remote worlds to serve some now discharged or forgotten purpose of Priest-Kings; but now I knew better; now I could see them as men; and now, more significantly, I recalled what I had heard whispered of once before, in a tavern in Ar, the terrible Scar Codes of the Wagon Peoples, for each of the hideous marks on the face of these men had a meaning, a significance that could be read by the Paravaci, the Kassars, the Kataii, the Tuchuks as clearly as you or I might read a sign in a window or a sentence in a book. At that time I could read only the top scar, the red, bright, fierce cordlike scar that was the Courage Scar. It is always the highest scar on the face. Indeed, without that scar, no other scar can be granted. The Wagon Peoples value courage above all else. Each of the men facing me wore that scar.

  Now the man facing me lifted his small, lacquered shield and his slender, black lance. "Hear my name," cried he, "I am Kamchak of the Tuchuks!"

  As suddenly as he had finished, as soon as the men had named themselves, as if a signal had been given, the four kaiila bounded forward, squealing with rage, each rider bent low on his mount, lance gripped in his right hand, straining to be the first to reach me. 3 The Spear Gambling

  One, the Tuchuk, I might have slain with a cast of the heavy Gorean war spear; the others would have had free play with their lances. I might have thrown myself to the ground as the tart hunters fromAr, once their weapon is cast, covering myself with the shield; but then I would have been beneath the clawed paws of four squealing, snorting kaiila, while the riders jabbed at me with lances, off my feet, helpless.

  So gambling all on the respect of the Wagon Peoples for the courage of men, I made no move to defend myself but, heart pounding, blood racing, yet no sign visible of agitation on my face, without a quiver of a muscle or tendon betraying me, I stood calmly erect. On my face there was only disdain.

  At the last instant, the lances of four riders but a hand's breadth from my body, the enraged, thundering kaiila, hissing and squealing, at a touch of the control straps, arrested their fierce charge, stopping themselves, tearing into the deep turf with suddenly emergent claws. Not a rider was thrown or seemed for an instant off balance. The children of the Wagon Peoples are taught the saddle of the kaiila before they can walk. "Aieee" cried the warrior of the Kataiil

  He and the others turned their mounts and backed away a handful of yards, r
egarding me. I had not moved. "My name is Tarl Cabot," I said. "I come in peace. The four riders exchanged glances and then, at a sign from the heavy Tuchuk, rode a bit away from me. I could not make out what they were saying, but an argument of some sort was in progress. I leaned on my spear and yawned, looking away toward the bosk herds. My blood was racing. I knew that had I moved, or shown fear, or attempted to flee, I would now be dead. I could have fought. I might perhaps then have been victorious but the probabilities were extremely slim. Even had I slain two of them the others might have withdrawn and with their arrows or boles brought me to the ground. More importantly, I did not wish to introduce myself to these people as an enemy. I wished, as I had said, to come in peace. At last the Tuchuk detached himself from the other three warriors and pranced his kaiila to within a dozen yards of me. "You are a stranger," he said. "I come in peace to the Wagon Peoples," I said. "You wear no insignia on your shield," he said. "You are outlaw." I did not respond. I was entitled to wear the marks of the city of Ko-ro-ba, the Towers of the Morning, but I had not done so. Once, long, long ago, Ko-ro-ba and Ar had turned the invasion of the united Wagon Peoples from the north, and the memories of these things, stinging still in the honest songs of camp skalds, would rankle in the craws of such fierce, proud peoples. I did not wish to present myself to them as an enemy. "What was your city?" he demanded. But to such a question, as a warrior of Ko-ro-ba, 1 could not but respond. "I am of Ko-ro-ba," I said. "You have heard of her." The Tuchuk's face tightened. Then he grinned. "I have heard sing of Ko-ro-ba," he said. I did not reply to him. He turned to his fellows. "A Koroban!" he cried. The men moved on their mounts, restlessly, eagerly said something to one another. "We turned you back," I said. "What is your business with the Wagon Peoples?" demanded the Tuchuk. Here I paused. What could I tell him? Surely here, in this matter, I must bide my time. "You see there is no insignia on my shield or tunic," I said. He nodded. "You are a fool," he said, "to flee to the Wagon Peoples." I had now led him to believe that I was indeed an outlaw, a fugitive. He threw back his head and laughed. He slapped his thigh. "A Koroban! And he flies to the Wagon Peop1es!" Tears of mirth ran from the sides of his eyes. "You are a fool" he said. "Let us fight," I suggested.