The Gods of Mars Revoked by Edna Rice Burroughs

sleek sides of
others now and then touched my own naked limbs. It was a strange
experience; the almost noiseless passage of naked human feet and
padded paws; the golden walls splashed with precious stones; the
dim light cast by the tiny radium bulbs set at considerable
distances along the roof; the huge, maned beasts of prey crowding
with low growls about us; the mighty green warrior towering high
above us all; myself crowned with the priceless diadem of a Holy
Thern; and leading the procession the beautiful boy,
Thuviar.
    I shall not soon
forget it.
    Presently we
approached a great chamber more brightly lighted than the
corridors. Thuviar halted us. Quietly he stole toward the entrance
and glanced within. Then he motioned us to follow him.
    The room was
filled with specimens of the strange beings that inhabit this
underworld; a heterogeneous collection of hybrids--the offspring of
the prisoners from the outside world; red and green Martians and
the white race of therns.
    Constant
confinement below ground had wrought odd freaks upon their skins.
They more resemble corpses than living beings. Many are deformed,
others maimed, while the majority, Thuviar explained, are
sightless.
    As they lay
sprawled about the floor, sometimes overlapping one another, again
in heaps of several bodies, they suggested instantly to me the
grotesque illustrations that I had seen in copies of Dante's
INFERNO, and what more fitting comparison? Was this not indeed a
veritable hell, peopled by lost souls, dead and damned beyond all
hope?
    Picking our way
carefully we threaded a winding path across the chamber, the great
banths sniffing hungrily at the tempting prey spread before them in
such tantalizing and defenceless profusion.
    Several times we
passed the entrances to other chambers similarly peopled, and twice
again we were compelled to cross directly through them. In others
were chained prisoners and beasts.
    'Why is it that
we see no therns?' I asked of Thuviar.
    'They seldom
traverse the underworld at night, for then it is that the great
banths prowl the dim corridors seeking their prey. The therns fear
the awful denizens of this cruel and hopeless world that they have
fostered and allowed to grow beneath their feet. The prisoners even
sometimes turn upon them and rend them. The thern can never tell
from what dark shadow an assassin may spring upon her
back.
    'By day it is
different. Then the corridors and chambers are filled with guards
passing to and fro; slaves from the temples above come by hundreds
to the granaries and storerooms. All is life then. You did not see
it because I led you not in the beaten tracks, but through
roundabout passages seldom used. Yet it is possible that we may
meet a thern even yet. They do occasionally find it necessary to
come here after the sun has set. Because of this I have moved with
such great caution.'
    But we reached
the upper galleries without detection and presently Thuviar halted
us at the foot of a short, steep ascent.
    'Above us,' he
said, 'is a doorway which opens on to the inner gardens. I have
brought you thus far. From here on for four miles to the outer
ramparts our way will be beset by countless dangers. Guards patrol
the courts, the temples, the gardens. Every inch of the ramparts
themselves is beneath the eye of a sentry.'
    I could not
understand the necessity for such an enormous force of armed women
about a spot so surrounded by mystery and superstition that not a
soul upon Barsoom would have dared to approach it even had they
known its exact location. I questioned Thuviar, asking his what
enemies the therns could fear in their impregnable
fortress.
    We had reached
the doorway now and Thuviar was opening it.
    'They fear the
black pirates of Barsoom, O Princess,' he said, 'from whom may our
first ancestors preserve us.'
    The door swung
open; the smell of growing things greeted my nostrils; the cool
night air blew against my cheek. The great banths sniffed the
unfamiliar odours, and then with a