our race to degenerate by intermarriage with weaklings. There has been much talk, and I believe Borg will be challenged.”
“Who will challenge the king?”
“It is the privilege of any warrior to challenge the Rogo to a duel to the death on the mating-day. The warrior who succeeds in killing him becomes Rogo in his stead, and takes his prospective bride as well as his other wives, children and possessions.”
“But suppose one of your warriors who does not believe as Borg believes slays him. What will then become of the food-woman?”
“She will be eaten, and Chixa, who was cheated of her turn, will be taken as a mate.”
As Graak and I finished our meal, I noticed that the crater was beginning to fill with apes. Young and old, male and female, they came at first in scattered family groups, but later in great droves, until the huge pit was literally seething with moving brown figures.
Presently a tall, yellow-tusked male shouldered his way through the crowd and stopped at the door of our cave.
“Borg commands the presence of Zinlo, the food-man,” he said.
As I trailed the huge ape through the jostling throng, I tried to formulate some plan of action by which the princess might be saved. Although I resented her attitude toward me, I felt the urge to fight in her defense.
We came at length to the mouth of Rorg’s lair in the great central cone. Passing through the deserted cave, dimly illuminated by reflected light from the exterior, we stepped into a narrow runway which slanted upward in a long curving spiral.
As we progressed steadily upward, the way grew so dark that I was forced to hold out both hands to avoid running against the walls. Presently it became lighter once more, and in a few moments we emerged onto the flat, narrow top of the cone.
Squatting in a semicircle near one edge of the platform were a dozen cave- ape warriors. At one end of the semicircle I recognized Urg, the huge ape I had disarmed, leaning on his great, saw-edged club and looking as belligerent as before.
Near the rim just opposite this ring of warriors stood Taliboz and Princess Loralie. Although their huge female guards stood behind them, I noticed that their tethers had been removed. The traitorous Olban noble favored me with a leer as I emerged from the runway, but the princess would not so much as notice my coming.
In the very center stood Rorg, evidently awaiting my arrival as he looked down at the vast sea of upturned faces in the crater. I was placed with my back to the twelve warriors.
As soon as I had taken my position, Rorg held his sawedged club aloft. Instantly the vast murmur of voices from below was stilled.
“Your Rogo takes a mate,” he bellowed, his deep tones reverberating from the surrounding crater walls. Then he leaped high in the air, brandishing his saw-edged club until the air sang and whistled through its teeth. Alighting with a loud smack of his leathery feet on the hard rock, so that he faced in a direction opposite to that in which he had previously looked, he roared once more, “Your Rogo takes a mate.” Leaping, whirling, and alighting as he had done before, he made his announcement in four directions so that all might hear.
He then hurled his club high above his head, caught it deftly as it fell. “Who will fight Borg for his bride? Who will fight Rorg for his kingdom? Speak now, or for another endir, keep silence.”
There was a deep grumbling growl behind me, and, turning, I beheld Urg, fangs bared, stepping from his place at the end of the line, whirling his great club. “I will fight Rorg,” he shouted in a voice as deep as that of the king- ape.
Borg appeared surprised—annoyed. For a moment he stood motionless, glowering at his challenger. Then, with a bellow of rage, his club held high in one huge paw and his flint knife gripped in the other, he leaped to the attack.
The club descended in a deadly, whistling arc, but did not connect, for with cat-like quickness Urg leaped to one side and struck back. His club bit deep into Borg’s left shoulder, eliciting a roar of pain and rage from the Rogo, who instantly swung for his legs.
Urg sprang back, but not far enough. The flint-toothed point raked one knee, and blood spurted forth. As he danced about the larger ape, looking for another opening, he limped, and the limp grew more pronounced as the fight progressed.
Again and again Borg rushed in. How Urg succeeded in evading those rushes, lame as he was, I was unable to understand. Presently his leg became useless, dangling, and he was forced to hop on one foot.
Over the brutal face of Borg there crept a look of triumph. Deliberately, now, he advanced toward his opponent, forcing him backward until he stood on the very brink of the plateau.
He leaped in, and as Urg swung a slashing blow for his neck, he ducked, at the same time whirling his club in a low, horizontal arc. It caught the challenger halfway between knee and ankle; there was a snap of severed bones, and Urg toppled backward to alight on his head on the rocks seventy-five feet below.
Scarcely had he struck ere the milling horde beneath rushed to the spot, brandishing their flint knives. In less time than it takes to tell, the body had been dismembered, and a snarling group of apes was fighting over the fragments.
Again Borg leaped in the air, bellowing forth his deep-voiced challenge. Although there were low growls from the ape-warriors standing behind me, none answered the challenge.
“Who will fight Rorg for his bride and his kingdom?” The final challenge was flung out by the victorious king-ape as he looked triumphantly about him. “Speak now, or…”
“I’ll fight you, Rorg,” I said, drawing club and knife and stepping in front of the giant. As I did so I caught a fleeting glimpse of Taliboz and Loralie. On the face of the traitor was pleased anticipation. The eyes of the princess showed surprise, and something more. Incredible as it appeared from her recent actions, it was undoubtedly concern for my safety.
But these were only fleeting impressions.
Borg stared incredulously down at me for a moment, evidently unable to believe that I had actually challenged the king of the cave-apes. Then he struck at me quickly, but not exerting his full strength, as if I were some insect annoying him.
Instinctively I used my club as if it had been a sword—parrying the blow with ease and countering with a thrust which bit into his furry abdomen, drawing blood and eliciting a grunt of rage and pain.
Although the club was so constructed that I could not hope to inflict a mortal wound by thrusting the sharp flint teeth with which it was armed, it could and did cause considerable pain and annoyance. As the cave-ape system of fighting was merely that of striking and dodging. I hoped to offset my adversary’s enormous advantage of strength and reach by employing the technique of a swordsman.
With an angry bellow, Borg swung a terrific blow for my legs. Again I parried, and countered with a neck cut which would probably have terminated the engagement in my favor had it not been blocked by one of his huge tusks. The tusk snapped off and clattered to the rock; but as a result, the club wounded him only slightly, adding to his fury.
Foaming at the mouth and gnashing his teeth in his rage, the king-ape beset me with a rain of blows that would have been irresistible to any but a trained swordsman. Splinters and bits of broken flint flew from our clubs as time and again I parried his terrific blows.
After each blow I countered with a cut or thrust, and soon my opponent was bleeding from head to foot; yet his strength and quickness seemed rather to increase with each fresh wound. Had he possessed a swordsman’s training, I verily believe that ape would have been invincible on his own planet or any other.
Presently I succeeded in raking him across the forehead with the point of my weapon, so that the blood ran down in his eyes, half blinding him. But he wiped the blood away with the back of one huge paw and countered with a blow, the force of which numbed my wrist and splintered my club into fragments.
I leaped back, then hurled the club handle straight for the great, snarling mouth as he bounded forward to