The Chains Are Loosed

Chapter Fourteen

Not long did Kenton have to wait. Hardly had the faint hum of the sleep horn died than he felt a touch on his shoulder. He thought it was Zachel, and lay limp. Long fingers twitched his ears, raised his eyelids. He looked into the face of Gigi. He pulled out the little silken cylinders that shut off the compelling slumber of the horn.

“So that is how you did it.” Gigi examined them with interest. He squatted down beside Kenton.

“Wolf,” he said, “I have come to have a talk with you, so that you may know Zubran and me a little better; perhaps, see more clearly the road on which soon your feet may be set. I would sit here beside you, but some of those cursed priests may come prowling around. Therefore, in a moment I shall seat myself on Zachel’s stool. When I have done so, turn you around facing me, taking that highly deceptive attitude I have so often watched you assume.”

He stepped up on the bench, scanning both decks.

“We will have plenty of time.” He squatted again on the bench. “Zubran is with Klaneth, arguing about the gods. Zubran, although sworn to Nergal, thinks him a rather inferior copy of Ahriman, the Persian god of darkness. He is also convinced that this whole matter of warfare between Nergal and Ishtar for the ship lacks not only originality and ingenuity, but taste—something, indeed, that his own gods and goddesses would not do; if they did, would do much better. This angers Klaneth, which greatly rejoices Zubran.”

Once more he arose and looked about him.

“However,” he went on, “this time he is doing it to keep Klaneth and especially Zachel away while we talk, since Klaneth leans a great deal upon Zachel in these arguments. I have told them that I cannot bear their talk, and that I will watch on Zachel’s seat until it is finished. And it will not be finished until I return, for Zubran is clever, oh, very clever and he expects our talk to lead, ultimately, to permanent relief of his boredom.”

He glanced slyly at the ivory deck.

“So do not fear, wolf.” He swayed up on his dwarfed legs. “Only as I go, slip sideways and keep your eyes on me. I will give you warning if warning is needed.”

He waddled away, climbed into the overseer’s seat. Kenton, obeying him, turned sleepily; rested arm on bench and head on arm.

“Wolf,” said Gigi suddenly, “is there a shrub called the chilquor in the place from whence you came?”

Kenton stared at him, struck dumb by such a question. Yet Gigi must have some reason for asking it. Had he ever heard of such a shrub? He searched his memory.

“Its leaves are about so large.” Gigi parted finger-tips for inches three. “It grows only upon the edge of the desert and it is rare—sorrowfully rare. Look you—perhaps you know it by another name. Perhaps this will enlighten you. You bruise the buds just before they open. Then you mix them with sesamum oil and honey and a little burned ivory and spread it like a paste over your head. Then you rub and rub and rub—so and so and so—” he illustrated vigorously upon his bald and shining pate.

“And after a little,” he said, “the hair begins to sprout; like grain under the rains of spring it grows, until soon—lo—naked dome is covered. Instead of the light flying off affrighted from shining dome it plays within new hair. And once more the man who was bald is beautiful in the eyes of woman!

“By Nadak of the Goats! By Tanith, the dispenser of delights!” cried Gigi with enthusiasm. “That paste grows hair! How it does grow hair! Upon a melon would it grow it. Yes, even those planks rightly rubbed by it would sprout hair like grass! You are sure you do not know it?”

Struggling with his stark amaze Kenton shook his head.

“Well,” said Gigi, sorrowfully. “All this the chilquor buds can do. And so I search for them—” here he sighed mightily—“who would once more be beautiful in woman’s eyes.”

He sighed again. Then one by one he flecked the backs of the sleeping slaves with Zachel’s whip—even the back of Sigurd.

“Yes,” he said, “yes, they sleep.”

His black eyes twinkled on Kenton, the slit mouth grinned.

“You wonder,” he said, “why I talk of such trivial matters as shrubs and hair and bald pates, while you lie chained. Well, wolf, these matters are far from trivial. They brought me here. And were I not here—would you have hope of freedom, think you? Ah, no,” said Gigi. “Life is a serious matter. Therefore all parts of it must be serious. And therefore no part of it can be trivial. Let us rest for a moment, wolf, while you absorb that great truth.”

Again, one by one, he flecked the backs of the sleeping slaves.

“Well, wolf,” he went on, “now I shall tell you how I came aboard this ship because of the chilquor, its effect on hair and because of my bald pate. And you shall see how your fortune rests upon them. Wolf, when I was but a child in Nineveh, girls found me singularly attractive.

“‘Gigi!’ they would cry as I passed by them. ‘Gigi, little love, little darling! Kiss me, Gigi!’”

Gigi’s voice was ludicrously languishing; Kenton, forgetting his plight, could not restrain laughter.

“You laugh, wolf!” observed the drummer. “Well—that makes us understand each other better.”

His eyes twinkled impishly.

“Yes,” he said, “‘Kiss me,’ they cried. And I would kiss them, because I found them all as singularly attractive as each found me. And as I grew this mutual attraction increased. You have no doubt noticed,” said Gigi complacently, “that I am an unusual figure of a man. But as I grew out of adolescence my greatest beauty was, perhaps, my hair. It was long and black and ringleted, and it fell far over my shoulders. I perfumed it and cared for it, and the tender little vessels of joy who loved me would twine their fingers in it when I lifted them upon my head or when my head was on their knees. They joyed in it even as I.

“And then I had a fever. When I recovered, all my beautiful hair was gone!”

He paused to sigh again.

“There was a woman of Nineveh who pitied me. She it was who anointed my head with the chilquor paste; told me how to make it; showed me the growing shrub. After years of—ah, mutual attraction—I had fever again. And again my hair vanished. I was in Tyre then, wolf, and made what haste I could to return to Nineveh. When I did return the kindly woman was dead and a sand storm had covered the spot where she had pointed out to me the chilquor shrubs!”

He sighed, prodigiously. Kenton, amused and fascinated by his tale as he was, could not forbear a suspicious glance after that melancholy exhalation. It seemed overdone.

“Then before I could search further,” went on Gigi, hurriedly, “word came to me that one who loved me—a princess, wolf—was on her way to Nineveh to see me. Shame was mine and anguish! I could not meet her with a bald pate, wolf. For no one loves a bald man!”

“Nobody loves a fat man,” grinned Kenton. He had spoken, it seemed in his own tongue, for the drummer apparently had not understood.

“What did you say?” he asked.

“I said,” answered Kenton, gravely, “that for one whose excellencies are as great as yours, the loss of your hair should have been of no more consequence to a woman than the falling of one feather from a pet bird.”

“That is a fine tongue of yours,” remarked Gigi, stolidly. “It can say so much in so few sounds.

“Well,” he continued. “I was distressed indeed. I could have hidden—but I feared my will would not be strong enough to keep me hid. She was a very lovely princess, wolf. Besides, I knew that if she found out I was in Nineveh, as find out she surely would, she would rout me out. She was a fair woman, wolf. And this is the one difference between the fair women and the dark—that the latter wait for you to come for them, but the former search for you. And I could go to no other city to hide—for in each of them were other women who admired me. What was I to do?”

“Why didn’t you get a wig?” asked Kenton, interested now in Gigi’s tale to the extent of forgetting entirely where he was.

“I told you, wolf, that they loved to thread their fingers through my locks,” answered Gigi, severely. “Could any wig stay in place under such treatment? Not when the women were such as loved me—No! No! I will tell you what I did. And here is where you will see how my lost hair and you are entangled. The High Priest of Nergal in Nineveh was a friend of mine. I went to him and asked him first to work a magic that would plant my head afresh with hair. He was indignant—said that his art was not to be debased for such a common purpose.

“It was then, wolf, that I began to have my suspicions of the real power of these sorcerers. I had seen this priest perform great magic. He had raised phantoms that had raised my hair—when I had it. How much easier then ought it to have been for him to have raised my hair without the trouble of raising the phantoms too? I suggested this. He grew more indignant—said that he dealt with gods, not barbers!

“But now I know better. He could not do it! I made the best of the matter, however, and asked him to put me for a while where my princess could not find me and where, weak willed, I could not go to her. He smiled, wolf, and said he knew just the place. He inducted me as an acolyte to Nergal and gave me a token that he said would insure me recognition and good will from one he named Klaneth. Also he sealed me with certain vows, not to be broken. I took them cheerfully, thinking them but temporary and his friend Klaneth the high priest of some hidden temple where I would be safe. I went to sleep that night trustfully, happy as a child. I awakened, wolf—here!

“It was a sorry jest,” muttered Gigi, angrily. “And a sorry jest would it be for that Ninevite priest if I knew the way back to him!

“And here I have been ever since,” he added, briskly. “Barred by my acolytage to Nergal from crossing to that other deck where there is a little vessel of joy named Satalu that I would fain take within my hands. Barred by my vows from slaying Klaneth. Barred by other vows from leaving the ship wherever it may touch for food and gear—since it was sanctuary I asked from which I could not go nor my princess come to me. By Tiamat of the Abyss—I got the sanctuary I asked!” he exclaimed, ruefully enough. “And by Bel who conquered Tiamat—as weary of the ship and its fruitless strife as Zubran himself!

“But were I not here,” he added, as by afterthought, “who could loose you of your chains? By shrub and lack of hair, an amorous princess and my vanity—these brought me on the ship to set you free when you came. Of such threads do the gods weave our destinies.”

He leaned forward, all malice gone from twinkling eyes, a grotesque tenderness on the froglike mouth.

“I like you, wolf,” he said, simply. “And do you like Gigi a little better now?”

There was wistfulness in the question; wistfulness and utter sincerity. Kenton’s heart went out to him without reserve.

“I like you, Gigi.” There were tears in his eyes. “Greatly, indeed, do I like you. And trust fully. But—Zubran—”

“Have no doubts about Zubran,” snapped Gigi. “He, too, was tricked upon this ship and is even more eager than I to be free. Some day he shall tell you his story, as I have mine. Ho! Ho!” laughed the drummer. “Ever seeking the new, ever tiring of the known is Zubran. And this was his fate—to be shot into a whole new world and find it worse than his old. Nay, wolf, fear not Zubran. With shield and sword will he stand beside you—until he tires even of you. But even then will he be loyal.”

Suddenly he grew solemn; kept unwinking gaze on Kenton, searching, it seemed, his soul.

“Consider well, wolf,” he whispered. “The odds are all against you. We two may not help you as long as Klaneth is lord of his deck. It may be that you cannot free the long-haired one beside you. You have Klaneth to face and twenty of his men—and, it may be, Nergal! And if you lose—death for you, wolf—and only after long, long torture. Here, chained to your oar, you are at least alive. Consider well!”

And Kenton, without hesitation answered him; held out to him his prisoned wrists.

“When will you loose my chains, Gigi?” was all he said.

Gigi’s face lighted, his black eyes blazed, he sprang upright, the jet loops on his pointed ears dancing.

“Now!” he shouted. “By Sin, the Father of Gods! By Shamash his Son and by Bel the Smiter—now!”

He thrust his hands between Kenton’s waist and the great circlet of bronze that bound it; pulled it apart as though it had been made of putty. With those same prodigiously long fingers he broke the locks of the manacles on Kenton’s wrists.

“Run free, wolf!” he whispered. “Run free—but craftily! And when you bite bite deep!”

With never a look behind him, he waddled slowly to the pit’s steps and up them. Slowly Kenton stood upon his feet. His chains dropped from him. He looked down at the sleeping Viking. How could he unfasten his links? How, if he could unfasten, awaken him before Zachel came hurrying down among the slaves?

Swiftly he thought. A plan formed. If he could pick the locks that held Sigurd, he could put back his own broken chains upon himself; whisper to the Viking after the waking whistle shrilled what he had done, what had been done for him. Then at the right moment, the pair of them could rise, rush the overseer, slay him and leap for Sharane’s deck—for it came to him that Sigurd, vowed as little either to Nergal or Ishtar as himself—could pass as easily as he the barrier that held all others back.

Again he looked about him. At the foot of the overseer’s high stool lay a shining knife, long-bladed, thin-bladed! Dropped there by Gigi for him? He did not know. But he did know that with it he might pick the Viking’s locks. He took a step toward it—

How long he was in taking the second step! And there was a mist before his eyes! Through that mist the sleeping forms of the oarsmen wavered—were like phantoms! And now he could no longer see the knife.

He rubbed his eyes, looked down on Sigurd. He was a wraith, his outlines nebulous, foglike!

He looked at the sides of the ship. They melted away even as he sought them! He had a glimpse of sparkling turquoise sea. And then—it became vaporous! Was not! Ceased to be!

And now Kenton floated for an instant in thick mist shot through with silvery light. The light snapped out. He hurtled through a black void filled with tumult of vast winds that shrieked and roared but touched him never. On and on, like a meteor, he flew through that black void—

The blackness snapped out! Through his closed lids he saw light. And he was no longer falling. He stood, rocking, upon his feet. He opened his eyes.

Once more he was within his own room! Outside hummed the traffic of the avenue, punctuated by blasts of auto horns.

Kenton rushed over to the jeweled ship. Except for the slaves, on it was but one little figure—one toy. A manikin who stood halfway down the pit steps, mouth open, whip at feet, stark astonishment in every rigid line.

Zachel, the overseer!

Kenton poked him with a contemptuous finger. A toy!

He looked down into the slave pit. They lay asleep, oars in rests. He touched the bent head of Sigurd, lovingly. With finger-tips tried to move the chains on the empty seat on the bench beside the Norseman; the empty chains that fell from the oar. They were immovable—all, all immovable. Toy chains, toy oars. Sigurd—a toy! Zachel—a toy! His adventures—a dream!

So his mind, back in its own familiar environment, told him; that other part of him, which accepted the ship as reality, lying dazed with swift flight within him. And suddenly he caught sight of himself in the long mirror! Stood, wondering, before it! For what he saw was no more the Kenton who had been borne out of that room upon the breast of the inrushing mystic sea. Mouth had hardened, eyes grown fearless, falcon bright. Over all his broadened chest the muscles ran, not bulging, bound—but graceful, flexible, and steel hard! He flexed his arms, and the muscles ran rippling along them. He turned, scanned his back in the mirror.

Scars covered it, healed teeth marks of the lash. The lash of Zachel—

Zachel—the toy!

No toy had made those scars!

No oars of toy had brought into being those muscles!

And suddenly all Kenton’s mind awoke. Awoke and was filled with shame, with burning longing, seething despair.

What would Sigurd think of him when he awakened and found him gone—Sigurd with whom he had sworn blood brothership? What would Gigi think—Gigi, who had made vow for vow with him; and trusting him, had broken his chains? And—

Sharane!

Fresh food for her mockery, her contempt—this!

A frenzy shook him. God! He must get back! Get back before Sigurd or Gigi or Sharane knew that he was no longer on the ship. Had fled again to that place—what was it Sharane had said—the place he fled when peril threatened?

How long had he been away? As though in answer a clock began chiming. He counted. Eight strokes!

Two hours of his own time had passed while he was on the ship. Two hours only? And in those two hours all these things had happened? His body changed to—this?

Then in the two minutes he had been in the room what had happened on the ship? Did they now not know that he was gone? Sharane and Sigurd, Gigi and the Persian? Were holding him, liar, coward—traitor!

He must get back! He must!

Stop! What had Gigi said—“go craftily!”

He thought of the battle before him. Could he take his automatics with him when he went back—if he could go back? With them he could match any sorceries of the black priest. But they were in another room, in another part of his house. Again he looked at himself in the glass. If his servants saw him—thus! They would not know him. How could he explain? Who would believe him?

And they might tear him away—away from this room where the ship lay. This room that held his only doorway back into Sharane’s world!

He dared not risk it.

Then swift into his brain sprang the plan. He threw himself upon the floor. Grasped the golden chains that hung from the ship’s bow. So thin they were, so small, on this the ship of jeweled toys! He clenched them tight.

Then threw his whole will upon the ship! Summoning it! Commanding it!

And suddenly the golden chains stirred within his grasp. They swelled. He felt a tearing wrench that wrung from him a groan of agony. Thicker grew the chains. They were lifting him. Lifting him! Again the dreadful wrenching, tearing at every muscle, nerve and bone.

His feet swung free.

The vast winds howled around him—for a heartbeat only. They were gone. In their place was the rushing of wind driven waves. He felt the kisses of their spray.

Kenton opened his eyes. Beneath him was a racing azure sea. High above him curved the scimitared prow of the Ship of Ishtar. But not the ship of jeweled toys. No! The ensorcelled ship that sailed the strange world; the ship on which blows were real and death lurked—death that even now might be watching him poised to grapple.

The living ship that held the promise of—Sharane!

The chain he clutched passed up the side of the bow and into a hawser port painted like a great eye between the bow-ward wall of her cabin and the curved prow. Behind him the great oars rose and fell. He could not be seen from them; the oarsmen’s backs were toward him and the oar ports were besides covered with strong leather, through which the shanks slipped; shields to protect the rowers from waves dashing past those ports. Nor, under the hang of the hull as he was, could he be seen from the black deck.

Slowly, silently, hand over hand, pressing his body as close to the hull as he could, he began to creep up the chain.

Up to Sharane’s cabin. Up to that little window that opened into her cabin from the closed bit of deck beneath the great scimitar.

Slowly, more slowly, he crept; pausing every few links to listen, reached at last the hawser port; threw a leg over the bulwark, and dropped upon the little deck. He rolled beneath the window; flattened himself against the cabin wall; hidden now from every eye upon the ship; hidden even from Sharane, should she peer through that window.

Crouched there—waiting!