Black Amazon of Mars
A Novel by LEIGH BRACKETT
[Transcriber Note: This etext was produced from Planet Stories March1951. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S.copyright on this publication was renewed.]
CONTENTS
I
II
III
IV
V
VI
VII
VIII
IX
I
Through all the long cold hours of the Norland night the Martian had notmoved nor spoken. At dusk of the day before Eric John Stark had broughthim into the ruined tower and laid him down, wrapped in blankets, on thesnow. He had built a fire of dead brush, and since then the two men hadwaited, alone in the vast wasteland that girdles the polar cap of Mars.
Now, just before dawn, Camar the Martian spoke.
"Stark."
"Yes?"
"I am dying."
"Yes."
"I will not reach Kushat."
"No."
Camar nodded. He was silent again.
The wind howled down from the northern ice, and the broken walls rose upagainst it, brooding, gigantic, roofless now but so huge and sprawlingthat they seemed less like walls than cliffs of ebon stone. Stark wouldnot have gone near them but for Camar. They were wrong, somehow, with ataint of forgotten evil still about them.
The big Earthman glanced at Camar, and his face was sad. "A man likes todie in his own place," he said abruptly. "I am sorry."
"The Lord of Silence is a great personage," Camar answered. "He does notmind the meeting place. No. It was not for that I came back into theNorlands."
He was shaken by an agony that was not of the body. "And I shall notreach Kushat!"
Stark spoke quietly, using the courtly High Martian almost as fluentlyas Camar.
"I have known that there was a burden heavier than death upon mybrother's soul."
He leaned over, placing one large hand on the Martian's shoulder. "Mybrother has given his life for mine. Therefore, I will take his burdenupon myself, if I can."
He did not want Camar's burden, whatever it might be. But the Martianhad fought beside him through a long guerilla campaign among the harriedtribes of the nearer moon. He was a good man of his hands, and in theend had taken the bullet that was meant for Stark, knowing quite wellwhat he was doing. They were friends.
That was why Stark had brought Camar into the bleak north country,trying to reach the city of his birth. The Martian was driven by somesecret demon. He was afraid to die before he reached Kushat.
And now he had no choice.
"I have sinned, Stark. I have stolen a holy thing. You're an outlander,you would not know of Ban Cruach, and the talisman that he left when hewent away forever beyond the Gates of Death."
Camar flung aside the blankets an