The attention of the warriors bent upon annihilating Mike was diverted by the intriguing spectacle of this strange four-armed creature refusing to be clubbed to death. So Mike was able to get in some telling blows that felled three more of the terrible warriors.
He knew however, that the end was already written in the bloody sands around him. He could only fight to the last moment, bringing down as many of the enemy as possible.
His heart was sick at what would surely be Doree's fate. He saw her just beyond the perimeter of battle still held by her two captors who were viewing the fight with rapt interest. If he could only reach her.
One swing of his gun butt and she would serve no vile purpose in the hands of these raiders.
[Illustration: The beastman's intent was all too clear.]
Mike mowed a bloody path in her direction. He covered more than half the distance before he knew he would never make it.
However, the end of this affair was not written in the sands, but in the skies overhead. Mike realized this when the attackers stopped fighting, all eyes turned heavenward in sudden terror. Mike's eyes followed theirs and he saw the ship.
It was a craft such as he could never have imagined in dream or reverie. A great rectangular platform, its polished sides inlaid with gold and fist-sized gems. There was a high railing around its edge over which myriad faces peered down. Above it, elevated upon shining cables, were two glowing balls not more than two feet in diameter, and even in his preoccupation with more serious matters, Mike realized the whole craft was suspended from these two balls, that they were its means of buoyancy.
Then he was in the midst of a disordered flight as the warriors charged screaming back to the forest. The ship was settling swiftly toward the surface of the river and now a crystalline ray of some sort shot out from the forward deck, cutting down the terrorized warriors in their flight.
Every able-bodied one had fled the scene of battle. Some gained the forest where the crystalline ray crisped the overgrowth into black ashes as it nipped at their singed heels. Those not fortunate enough to escape were but small nubs of blackened ashes on the open shore.
The ray had avoided touching the heart of the battleground and Mike found himself standing alone among the bodies of the blacks he had dispatched. Nicko was getting wearily to his feet. Doree stood frozen nearby, abandoned by her captors, the great ship holding her gaze as a snake would hold that of a bird.
The ship hung motionless a few inches above the rushing water, its port side flanking the shore. And as a section of the railing arced down from its position to become a landing ladder, Mike realized the futility of delayed flight.
This was a fighting ship; a patrol craft ready and able to spread devastation in any direction. There were perhaps a hundred men aboard and as a squad filed down the ladder, Mike was struck by the perfection of their six-foot bodies and by the pride and arrogance of their manner.
Their attitude was one of casual contempt mixed with mild interest.
Doree had moved into the shelter of his arm and the grumbling Nicko had also come close but with interest centered more upon his aching scales than this new possible enemy.
While the squad stood at attention, their leader surveyed the bloody section of shore. He checked each of the prone men and found only one still alive, a seven-foot, ebon-skinned warrior who got to his feet when the leader kicked him and stood erect but swaying drunkenly from the blow Mike had laid across his skull during the battle.
Shoving the warrior roughly toward the silent trio, the leader took a small object from the gold-inlaid shoulder sack that seemed to be a part of his uniform. The object consisted of a short rod with a crystal ball on one end. The man grasped the ball in his palm, pointed the rod at the fallen men and began spraying them with the same crystalline ray that had emanated from the ship. The resulting fire was instantaneous and intense. The prone bodies crackled for a moment and were reduced to charred fragments. The leader went about this work with the distasteful look of a man cleaning out a garbage pail. When the task was finished, he turned his attention to the four prisoners.
Nicko was the prime object of his interest. He cut the little Martian out of the group, shoving him roughly aside, then walked slowly around him several times as though unable to convince himself that such an improbable creature could really exist.
A sharp command from the deck of the ship terminated his inspection and he spoke brusquely to the group in a tongue Mike did not understand.
"What did he say?" Mike asked of Nicko.
For once, the latter was not interested. "How do I know?" he growled.
"Gad! My aching back!"
The leader motioned to the squad, whereupon the prisoners were pushed toward the ladder.
The boarding was accomplished swiftly. The prisoners were herded forward and onto a gold-inlaid bench just above the prow. The ladder was lifted and the craft moved straight upward like an elevator.
After ascending three or four hundred yards, it leveled off and swept gently forward, down-river. None of those aboard laid hands upon the prisoners. Nicko was still the center of attention and also of the conversation passed among the soldiers. They were handsome specimens, erect and beautifully built, clad in identical uniforms the cost of which would have been staggering on Terra or anywhere else in the System.
"This ship," Mike said. "Is there anything familiar about it?"
He had spoken to Doree and the latter looked at him questioningly and then glanced about the ship. "I've certainly never seen anything like it before."
"Of course not, but the styling, the decorations, they could only be classed as--"
"Egyptian!"
"At least a forerunner of what we consider Egyptian. And this river.
Look out ahead of us. See how it broadens. See the wide level fields on either side."
"The Nile," Doree whispered.
"Not the Nile, but obviously a sister. The Egyptians who fled this planet certainly hunted until they found exactly what they wanted--found it on Terra in a system far from their own."
Mike turned his attention to a conversation that was going on between Nicko and the black prisoner. The language was a primitive guttural of some sort but Nicko was obviously using it skilfully. He grinned at Mike and said, "We were wrong about those people. They are fine characters. This is M'landa, a leader of the tribe known as the H'Lorkas--or at least that's as close as I can give it to you in Terran. He is an extremely fine fellow."
"Is that so?" Mike asked grimly. "Then why did they grab Doree?"
"They meant her no harm. They didn't want her injured."
"I can imagine why. And if they're such fine fellows why did they attack us?"
The question seemed to embarrass Nicko. "I guess my aim wasn't so bad after all. They were keeping a sharp eye on us--wishing us no harm whatever. But when I fired, I killed one so they naturally got sore."
"What does he know about this outfit?"
"Scoundrels. We would have been better off with the H'Lorkas. This is a patrol ship of the Ptomenites. They are the tyrants of this planet, their power contested only by the people of Baserite to the north. But the Baserites always come out on the bloody end of the stick."
"Has he any idea what will happen to us?"
"He expects to be sacrificed to some slob of a god they worship. Then his body will be preserved and put in a trophy room they call the Gallery of the Dead."
Mike turned a quick, meaningful look at Doree, but he had no time to comment because at that moment the door of a small cabin opened and a girl came forth. The cabin was aft of the ship and the girl came swiftly forward, pride and arrogance written in every line of her beautiful body.
But it was not these qualities that caused Mike to gasp and Doree to blush deeply. It was the regal figure's almost complete nudity. She wore only the briefest of attire across her breast and hips.
"My dark friend says that's Katal'halee, Princess of the Ptomenites,"
Nicko whispered. "She rides along with the boys once in a while for the exhilarating pleasure of it."
"I imagine the boys get a little pleasure out of having her along, too," Mike said.
Then, with the queenly nude not a dozen feet away, Doree grasped Mike's arm. He glanced across and saw that her eyes were sweeping past Katal'halee to the small cabin. Its door had again opened. Two men emerged and moved forward. They seemed entirely at home and wore smug smiles.