Author: Kirk Straughen
Synopsis: In this science fiction adventure story set on a mythical Mars, Eric Leon, an archaeologist, discovers an intriguing map which sets him off on a quest to discover the legendary Oasis of the Emerald Flame and its unknown and mysterious perils. What will our intrepid hero discover? There is but one way to discover the answer to that question - join him on his daring expedition.
Edit history: Minor changes were made to this story on 3 June 2021
Chapter1: Secrets of an Ancient Map
Eric Leon slowed the rolling gate of his ungainly therem as he entered the soothing shade of a towering mesa – one of many that rose in grim and silent majesty from the dusty crimson Plain of Hadris. His mount, which resembled a camel in body shape but with a parrot-like head and hide of mud brown scales, uttered a recalcitrant hiss as the tall, lean archaeologist hauled firmly on the reins and brought the beast to a halt.
Leon removed his hat as he sat saddle and wiped the sweat from his brow. He gazed across a seemingly endless waste of burning aridity that stretched from horizon to horizon. Its unending bleakness was broken here and there by jutting buttes of rosy sandstone eroded into fantastic shapes by the moaning winds of untold aeons.
The loneliness and desolation was omnipresent with depressing palpability. The only life to be seen was an occasional grove of stunted sori bush whose thorny domes defied this abode of soul destroying wretchedness that was the equatorial Martian desert.
Leon took a miserly sip of tepid water from his canteen; then consulted his map. He was a long way from Port Alpha – that miniscule speck of human civilization near the shore of the Sea of Thara, which had grown on the face of Mars like an unwelcome wart. Uutham Oois it was called by the local natives – The Place of Fools, a fitting name for Earthmen who braved the desolateness of this godforsaken planet.
The strange parchment of the map crackled beneath Leon’s callused fingers. His angular sun bronzed face furrowed in concentration and his lips moved silently as he read the ancient, time faded hieroglyphics of classical Yisidra that had been embossed upon the mouldering chart.
Six months ago he had found the map in the musty library of the Monastery of Tethim. In their isolated fastness the blind monks spent their days in strange drug induced dreams that were recorded in the spidery script of Ly by novices who, at the completion of their training, would have their eyes cut out with golden knives so as not to be distracted by the mundane world.
Leon shivered at the memory of the grim, fortress-like building and its unearthly occupants who dwelt in the forbidding, ice bound waste of the southern pole. Mars was a strange, cruel world, he reflected grimly as he consulted his compass, then folded the tattered map and slipped it in his soiled shirt pocket.
The archaeologist put spurs to his ugly mount and urged it onward. The beast whom Leon had given several names, most of them unprintable, resumed its lumbering pace with the same perverse unwillingness with which it had stopped.
Not far now, thought the man. If the map is right my goal should be just beyond that ridge of sandstone hills.
Within half an hour he was mounting the crumbling acclivity, littered with the broken detritus from its time worn heights. The therem climbed the steep gradient with shrill protests as its broad, clawed feet slipped on the treacherous ground. Leon cursed and spurred the brute.
“Up, You Bastard,” he urged, using the least offensive of the names he had given his evil tempered mount.
You Bastard hissed in protest, turned its ugly head and tried to bite him. The Earthman thumped its beak with his fist. The therem desisted with ill grace and lumbered up the remaining distance hissing with all the venom its vile temperament could muster.
The archaeologist gained the ridgeline and looked down upon a shallow bowl formed by the ring of the encircling hills. The sight took his breath away. A placid lake lay in the centre of the expansive depression and around it a dense growth of tall, graceful trees with opal foliage rose to meet the sky in stately majesty. After weeks of travel in the desolate and depressing wilderness it seemed as if the gates of heaven had swung wide and he now stood on the threshold of paradise.
His eyes roved hungrily over the lush scene and settled upon the small island in the middle of the lake and the strange ruin that stood upon it. Leon’s mind recalled the faded hieroglyphs on the ancient map and their enigmatic reference to the Oasis of the Emerald Flame. The name had intrigued the archaeologist with its air of mystery. He had proposed an expedition to the site, but his colleagues were busy with their own diggings, so perforce he had come alone to this remote and largely unexplored region of Mars.
Up to this point Leon had held his emotions in check in case the map had sent him on a fool’s errand, but now that his eyes beheld the reality of the object of his quest elation flooded his being in a heady tide, and his leathery features split into a broad grin of unbounded joy. What secrets, he wondered, would his ancient map reveal?
The archaeologist forced himself into a more sober mood. Several years of hard experience on this wild planet had made him cautious. The place looked deserted, but one could never be really sure of anything on this strange world. He checked his weapons – a short sword of Martian bronze and its companion dagger. He would have preferred a 45 automatic, but no modern weapons were permitted beyond the walls of Port Alpha – a measure enforced to help protect the natives from unscrupulous Earthmen.
Confidant he was as well prepared as he could be, Leon urged his mount over the ridge and the grumbling beast slipped and slid down the treacherous acclivity, and after several near catastrophes eventually arrived at the foot of the hill and thrust its scaly bulk between the black, warty boles of the overarching trees.
Shadowed silence enveloped the mount and its rider. Leon looked warily about. Quiet lay like a leaden shroud upon the oasis. The unearthly stillness seemed palpable – like the calm before the storm. It was a sharp contrast to the beauty of the place when seen from a distance. The very air seemed charged with menace and the Earthman felt his nape hairs prickle warningly in response to unseen danger.
Leon wasn’t a coward, but he wasn’t a fool either. He turned his mount in preparation to beat a hasty retreat from the invisible menace. It was then that the hidden foe cast their javelins. One streaking missile shot passed his head; another grazed the therem’s rump. You Bastard reared, bolted. The Earthman cursed as he fell and crashed to earth.
Leon struggled up and saw his erstwhile mount disappear into the dense undergrowth of opalescent fern-like vegetation with unaccustomed rapidity. A Martian burst from the verdure, sword swinging in a vicious arc. The being’s sudden appearance stilled the curse he was about to hurl at his fleeing steed.
The Earthman leapt aside and avoided the rush of his foe, then whipped out his own sword and dagger and aimed a cut at his opponent with the longer weapon. The Martian, who resembled a bipedal stick insect about the height of a man, blocked the shearing stroke with its dagger.
As they traded blow for ringing blow Leon glimpsed other enemies converging on him. Reckless desperation came upon the Earthman. He threw himself beneath his enemy’s flashing blade and drove his dagger into its thorax. The Martian collapsed with a screeching cry, yellow blood gushing from the puncture in its sable exoskeleton.
Leon turned in time to receive his other foes swift attack. The man parried one thrusting blade with his dagger, the other with his sword. He retreated before the enemy blades that seemed to strike at him with the swift deadliness of leaping serpents. Sweat beaded his brow and his face was grim. The odds were against him. Outnumbered, it was only a matter of time before hard bronze slipped past his guard and spilled his guts upon the sand.
The sand – that was it! His booted foot struck out kicking up a cloud of fine particles into the faces of his attackers. It was a brief distraction, but one that saved his life and ended that of his foes. A shearing stroke cleft one opponent’s head and the stricken being collapsed into the path of its half-blinded companion. The Earthman lunged and stretched the final foe lifeless upon the ground.
Breathing heavily, he looked warily about. No other threat presented itself, and he could only assume that he was unlucky enough to encounter a patrol that probably made a circuit of the oasis, which was perhaps three square miles in extent. He bitterly cursed his own stupidity. He had been too caught up in the fervour of making an archaeological discovery and the fame it would bring to consider the potential negative consequences of his quest.
Leon looked at the bloody corpses with regret. He loathed killing, but circumstances had compelled him to violence as no doubt it had compelled his dead opponents to seek his life. Again, his eyes raked the dense verdure. There was no sign of the ill tempered brute he rode. Without You Bastard he was effectively marooned in this oasis – the ungainly beast had run off with all his equipment and supplies. Stifling a curse he set off in search of the graceless creature.
His bushcraft soon revealed the path the panicked therem had taken. It appeared to be heading directly towards the lake. Leon cursed the beast and his luck. He was now compelled to follow the creature into the heart of hostile territory. Still, it was hardly surprising when he thought about it – they had been on the trail for several months, with the animal relying on the tough sori bushes as its sole and paltry source of moisture. It could smell the enticing water and was making a beeline for the life sustaining liquid.
Within about half an hour the archaeologist had arrived at the shore of the lake. The Earthman peered cautiously through the foliage and glimpsed You Bastard standing in the shallows filling its storage bladders with copious amounts of water.
The Earthman gazed upon the ugly creature with a mixture of relief and annoyance. The sooner he mounted the brute and got the hell out of here the better. Still, it wasn’t a complete loss – he had verified the existence of the oasis and its ruins. With a future, better prepared expedition he could mount a dig, provided peaceful relations could be established with the locals.
He looked carefully about. No other creature was in sight, but the perpetual and unnerving quiet made him jumpy. Again his hairs prickled, but this time he couldn’t tell if it was the presence of danger or the terrible silence that was playing on his overwrought nerves. Either way he couldn’t stand here forever.
Leon stepped out of concealment, his sword and dagger drawn. His eyes roved about the scene. All was silent – as placid as the lake before him. With extreme caution he advanced upon the gulping therem. It was then that the snaring net fell upon him as he passed beneath two overarching trees.
Chapter 2: Chamber of the Flame
Leon cursed in shock as the net entangled him. The Earthman struggled fiercely. He hacked madly at the enveloping mesh of bronze chains as six Martian warriors sprang from concealment and rushed towards him. But it was hopeless – the heavily weighted net hampered his every movement and he was surrounded in an instant by his foes who bound him, net and all, with other lengths of chain until he was thoroughly immobilised.
His captors, now completely sure he was utterly helpless, picked him up and carried him like pall bearers hoisting a coffin. It was a disturbing analogy, and the archaeologist soundly cursed himself for a fool – he’d blundered into their trap like a blind man, and when he was carried past his mount You Bastard seemed to give him a confirming look of infuriating, derisive mirth.
Leon spat a sullen curse at the therem, his captors, and Mars in general. With an effort he mastered his rage. If he was going to get out of this mess then he had to do it himself. The authorities at Port Alpha made it bluntly clear to every adventurer, explorer and scientist who stepped beyond the walls of Earth’s enclave that they did so at their own risk and were on their own.
The policy was harsh, true, but it did succeed in its objective of discouraging all but the toughest (or the most foolish) from venturing into the hostile wilderness of Mars and its barbaric oasis-kingdoms.
Barbaric, indeed, thought Leon as he turned his thoughts outward and began keenly observing his surroundings. If an opportunity to escape arose he knew he must be ready to grasp it.
From his limited viewpoint it seemed that his silent captors were carrying him towards a verdure choked stone causeway that led to the island in the centre of the lake. Shortly, they stepped upon it, confirming his suspicions, and fought their way through the hindering growth of centuries towards the soaring building upon the isle’s shore.
As they drew near the Earthman was able to get a better view of the structure. It was an octagonal, stepped tower of six levels and majestic height. Tall spires, some broken by the hand of time, adorned every corner of the building.
Closer and closer they came until Leon could see the ruin clearly. Most of it was intact, but untold ages had wrecked their havoc upon the sandstone. Trees grew in the structure – at its base, and half way up in the very walls of the building. Their levering roots had forced apart the monolithic blocks of stone and tumbled them in broken heaps. Thick clumps of fern-like plants sprouted among the jumbled masonry, and vines writhed like woody serpents upon the pitted hieroglyphs of the ancient walls.
Despite the danger he was in the archaeologist in Leon couldn’t help but be excited by what his eyes beheld. Anticipation came upon him as his captors bore him over fallen pillars, beneath a crumbling arch and then within the dim interior of the enigmatic building. He wondered what mysteries he would find and, more sombrely, if death would be the greatest of them all.
They passed down a gloomy hall of columns and emerged into a central room where a shaft of sunlight slanted through the cracked roof. The ray illuminated a waiting figure with its pellucid radiance, and caused the many gems set in its exoskeleton to glow with ethereal fire.
Leon’s captors stood him before the Martian and he stared into the being’s inscrutable, mask-like features – features which reminded him of a jumping spider with its enormous black eyes and mandibles. Leon wasn’t revolted. Despite the obvious physical differences Martians were much like men in some respects. The angry quivering of its olfactory antenna was the outward sign of an emotion both forms of life had in common.
The Martian spoke, its voice strangely modulated. The language was of the vanished Kingdom of Yisidra – a tongue older than Latin and just as dead to the rest of Mars. It took Leon several moments to recognise what was said, for the accents of the vowels were somewhat different to those theorised by the Earth scholars, who had studied the tongue from dusty scrolls found in the athenaeum of the Academy of Jedhura.
“A Soft Skin spy,” meditated the Martian, using the native appellation for a human being. “I thought so when my warrior-priests described the strange accoutrements strapped to the therem they saw drinking in the lake.”
“I’m not a spy,” explained Leon with more calmness than he felt. “I’m a scholar seeking knowledge of your people’s ancient past. It is this desire that has brought me here and nothing more. Myat tazu – I swear it.”
Xylatha, High Priest of the Emerald Flame, expressed its cynicism with a derisive twist of its antenna.
“A Soft Skin who seeks to learn from us?” continued Xylatha with undisguised sarcasm. “I didn’t know such humility existed in your people who came uninvited to this world of Saru and caused so much strife with their arrival. Yes, even we in our isolation have heard of these outrages.”
Leon kept silent. He wasn’t about to defend the excesses of the early years of Mars’ exploration – ‘unfortunate incidents’ as the administration delicately called the blatant looting of the tombs of native kings that occurred in those wild days of discovery. Prejudice was at the heart of it – the Martians weren’t insects; indeed they were a phylum all their own, but they looked like bugs and were all hermaphrodites. Consequently, they were treated with contempt.
Fortunately, attitudes had vastly improved in the last decade, with many of the stolen treasures being returned to their sacred resting places. But even so bitter memories of the violation of their ancient dead, and the trampling of the living’s rights ran deep in the minds of many Martians.
“So, you’d learn would you?” continued the cleric, sinisterly. Well then I, Xylatha, High Priest of the Flame shall be your teacher, but I think you shall not enjoy my lesson.” Then to the warrior-priests who held the Earthman in their bony grip: “Bring the prisoner to the Chamber of the Emerald Flame.”
As Leon was carried into the dark recesses of the building he speculated upon the mystery confronting him. He knew that Xylatha was a person of importance – his gem encrusted exoskeleton testified to that. The architecture of the structure was suggestive of a temple, and so he had correctly deduced that the Martian was the senior priest.
But what was the Emerald Flame? Leon was familiar with the major religions and philosophies of the planet. But Martian civilization was twice as old as Earth, and no doubt there were many unknown sects and cults that human anthropologists had yet to catalogue. The Earthman was certain he was now a prisoner of one of them.
Were they now taking him to the altar of an outlandish god to be offered up as a sacrifice? A surge of fear shot through Leon and he struggled wildly in his bonds, but to no avail. He was as helpless as a babe in the hands of his enigmatic captors, and so composed himself to meet his fate with what bravery he could muster.
But nothing could have prepared him for what he was about to see. The party entered another chamber, and the Earthman’s eyes fell upon a sight of utter strangeness. A hieroglyph encircled well, level with the floor, had been sunk in the centre of the pillared room, and from it leapt a whirling double helix of quivering emerald fire that illuminated the vastness of the chamber with its pulsing light.
It was a cold flame – a phantasm of ghostly light that danced with unearthly, silent grace before the eyes of the astounded archaeologist. What was it that confronted him with its alien weirdness – some strange elemental gas that welled up from the very bowels of the planet? Perhaps; then again it might be a manifestation so outside the realm of human experience as to be incomprehensible to the mind of man.
The voice of the High Priest broke through Leon’s wondering thoughts: “Behold the marvel of the Emerald Flame that has endured undiminished in its glory for untold ages.” Xylatha turned towards the Earthman as he was set upon his feet, and the archaeologist sensed the religious fervour that made his captor tremble with ecstatic fanaticism.
“The Society of the Flame is an ancient order,” continued Xylatha. “Once we were many, but when Yisidra fell to the encroaching desert only this isolated oasis was left to us. Here we have dwelt ever since – the surviving few of a once mighty faith that has been forgotten by the rest of Saru. But all that shall now change thanks to my discovery.”
Leon’s fascination was overshadowed by a sense of grim foreboding. Clearly he was prisoner to fanatics, and sensed they posed a wider threat than just to that of his own life. Grim faced, he kept silent, allowing the High Priest to continue its monologue in the hope Xylatha would let slip or openly reveal the nature and extent of its nefarious scheme.
The High Priest removed a black rod hanging from the strap-like apparel that Martians wore to carry things about.
“Observe carefully,” instructed Xylatha as it pointed the rod, which was about two feet in length at a substantial chunk of fallen stone, and depressed the silver stud upon it.
Instantly, a ray of crimson light infused with golden motes erupted from the cylinder. The hissing beam bathed the weighty block with its weird illumination. The strange radiance clung to the stone. It enveloped it in an effervescent halo of unnerving fire and, before the astonished archaeologist’s gaze, solid rock disintegrated to finest dust under its withering influence.
Xylatha turned to the speechless man. An aura of dark triumph seemed to surround the High Priest as it spoke in elated tones to the helpless prisoner.
“I have discovered that when certain substances are immersed within the Emerald Flame they are transformed to strange elements whose powers can be released by a process known only to me. The Flame has given us, its faithful worshippers, a weapon with which to conquer all of Saru and thus re-establish the primacy of our eternal truth.”
The High Priest perceived the coiling horror that choked the despised Soft Skin to utter silence. Xylatha’s antenna twitched with black mirth at its captive’s evident distress, and the being’s pleasure mounted even higher as it had a vision of the ancient glories of Yisidra being rebuilt upon the corpses of its hated enemies.
“Chain the prisoner to that pillar,” ordered the gloating cleric to its warriors, “then go and summon all the faithful.” Xylatha held the rod aloft as if it were a sceptre. “Let them witness the destruction of this puny Soft Skin with the power of the Flame. In this manner our glorious, world encompassing enterprise shall be inaugurated.”
Chapter 3: The Ray of Doom
Shock upon shock had befallen Leon in swift succession. His mind was dazed with the enormity of the threat facing all Mars. Earth’s enclave had no answer to this ray of doom, and the native oasis-kingdoms were armed with nothing more than medieval weaponry.
Mighty defensive walls would crumble like sand before the crimson ray and proud warriors would fall like wheat before the scythe. The fanatics might be few in number but their ranks would swell with every victory. An army with such weapons would be unstoppable.
The Earthman was desperate. He knew he had to do something to stop the slaughter that would soon come upon this unsuspecting world. He prepared to spring upon his foes as they began to free him from the net, but then commonsense prevailed and he reined in his wild plan.
His captors’ antenna quivered with extreme alertness. One false move and they’d cut him down without the slightest hesitation. Only reason allied with bravery could gift him with any hope of success. He remained outwardly passive as the warriors removed the net, stripped him of his weapons and chained him by the neck to the pillar.
“Think well upon your fate,” said Xylatha, darkly, “for it is one that shall befall all your kind and any others who dare oppose us. I go now to gather the faithful. They shall be inspired by witnessing your destruction.”
Leon watched the High Priest and its warriors leave the chamber and vanish into the darkness of the outer rooms. They left no guard to watch him, and Leon understood why they were confident he could not escape – the chain was thick, the column as solid as a mountain, and the Martian padlocks strong and cunningly designed.
There was, however, a means by which he might free himself, for he had foreseen the possibility that on this savage world he might one day find himself in chains. Leon lifted his left leg and began pulling at his boot heel. The man grunted as he worked, hoping that desert dust hadn’t fouled the join and jammed it shut. It seemed he endured an age of struggle, but eventually perseverance rewarded him – the cap slid off revealing the secret compartment within the heel of his boot.
Carefully, the Earthman removed two plastic vials from the hollow and replaced the cap upon his heel. He then turned his attention to the three foot length of chain that bound him to the pillar. After finding the thinnest of the hand forged links Leon broke the seals of the ampoules and poured the contents of one into the other. Each chemical by itself was relatively harmless, but when mixed together produced a powerful corrosive – a viscous fluid that he now carefully dripped on the chosen link.
Martian bronze began to hiss and froth as the oily acid attacked it. A booming gong suddenly chased away the silence – the signal to summon all the members of the cult. Leon, already worried about how much time he had became even more anxious. Even the weakest link was still quite thick and it was possible his foes might be upon him at any moment.
The link was eaten half way through when the tense Earthman thought he heard the distant sound of many footsteps. Were his nerves playing a devilish trick upon him? He forced aside the distracting thought and concentrated on the task at hand.
Shortly, the link had been corroded to a quarter of its thickness. But the faint sound had increased to a volume that left no doubt the Martians were rapidly approaching. Fear laid hold of Leon as he watched the final drop of acid fall upon the chain. He cursed – the last of the corrosive had been neutralized by the bronze, and a small thickness of defiant metal yet remained.
With both hands the Earthman grabbed the chain. He hauled desperately upon it, his frantic effort spurred by the many footfalls that were even louder than before. The weakened link snapped under his straining muscles and he quickly turned and pressed his back against the pillar to hide his sundered bonds.
Xylatha stepped within the room followed by the hoard of its fanatics. Leon wondered if the High Priest had seen him free himself. He waited tensely as his foes approached and formed a line before him. The Earthman’s darting gaze appraised his enemies. There must have been at least a hundred of them.
The High Priest approached within several yards of the heavily sweating archaeologist. Close, but not close enough. Leon silently cursed. The Martian was staying well clear of him. His wily foe wasn’t taking any chances.
Xylatha stared at Leon. The being’s antennas were held in an attitude of amused contempt. The Earthman returned the Martian’s look with a stony silence that masked his fear dried mouth and madly racing heart.
“I’ll make your death a horrid end,” murmured the High Priest in a tone that dripped with all the venom of a cobra. “I’ll start by disintegrating your arms, then your legs, then what’s left of you. Your demise will be quite a spectacle.”
Leon remained infuriatingly silent. Xylatha, unable to provoke its captive with tormenting words, uttered a low oath and turned to address its fellows. It was the moment the frantic Earthman had been desperately waiting for.
The archaeologist sprang at the Martian with all the swiftness of a lion. Xylatha, alerted by a warning shout from a fellow cultist swiftly turned. Leon saw the deadly rod swinging at him. His hand swept out, knocked the weapon upward, and its lethal beam flamed against the temple’s vaulted ceiling.
Cries of hot outrage exploded from the other Martians. They rushed to aid Xylatha as High Priest and Earthman surged about the chamber in a crazed dance for possession of the rod. As they fought the hissing ray waived wildly about. It slashed floor, walls and vault like a sword of raging fire.
Leon strove furiously with his wiry foe. From the edge of vision he glimpsed the charging cultists. It was a brief distraction but enough for Xylatha to trip the Earthman. He fell heavily to the floor. Fear stabbed the archaeologist with its blade of terror as the High Priest uttered a wild yell of triumph and swing the blazing rod upon him.
But the moment of Xylatha’s victory was the being’s defeat. The temple, already weakened by countless centuries and further damaged by the ray, began to fall. A huge block struck the High Priest and crushed it to the floor in bloody ruin. Other loosened stonework fell upon the racing cultists and their cries of anger quickly turned to screams of pain and fear.
Leon struggled up. Xylatha’s aim had been deflected by the chunk of masonry and the lethal ray had barely missed the Earthman, but now the temple was collapsing all around him. He dashed for the exit, shouldering through the milling Martians. Naked fear lent speed to his pounding feet. The air was choked with dust, the din from crashing stone smote his ears as the entire building trembled and plunging fragments struck him bruising blows.
By a miracle he made it out reasonably unscathed and to the safety of the causeway. Here he paused to rest, unable to go any further, and looked behind him. The temple’s collapse had accelerated. The roar of falling stone sounded like an avalanche. There was a sudden flare of greenish light as Xylatha’s weapons stockpile detonated in a soundless flash of disintegrating energy.
Silence suddenly settled upon the scene. Half the temple had vanished in that quiet explosion; what was left lay in utter ruin. But the danger was not over for the Earthman. Grim forms emerged from the cloud of dust that was slowly settling – six cultists had survived the devastation. They came towards him with drawn swords - stalking figures of utter menace that were bent on bloody vengeance.
Leon leaned against a tree. The Earthman was unarmed and weak from his strenuous exertions. He was in no condition to face six Martians who though frail in appearance were far tougher than any human could ever be. The archaeologist’s hands balled into fists and he hauled himself erect to face the foe as they swiftly closed in upon him.
It was then that You Bastard made its presence known in a most dramatic way. The therem charged from the undergrowth at the cultists. It skidded to a halt within short range of the startled foe, presented its unsightly rear to the enemy, and deployed its chemical weaponry with overwhelming force.
Special glands in its urinary bladder went into overdrive and the erupting spray of mephitic fluid would have made a skunk turn green with envy. The Martians would have turned a lime green shade as well if they’d been able, but for entirely different reasons – the stench was truly unbelievable.
It was as if a wrecking ball had struck the cultists in the face. They stiffened, their eyes seemed to take on a glazed appearance and froth bubbled from their mouthparts as they fell unconscious to the ground. Leon, even where he was standing, was not unaffected by the truly vile odour.
“Dear God!” he gasped as he staggered off and heaved his guts out in the bush for several minutes.
After a while the stench faded to a durable level. Leon managed to climb to his feet. He wiped his mouth and looked at the Martians who were stretched out in the dust and still unconscious. Even the fearsome Martian desert dragon had been known to flee before a therem. These poor fellows probably wouldn’t recover until nightfall.
And indeed the Earthman couldn’t help but feel sorry for them. They were an anachronism - the last of an ancient religion forgotten by this world. There were too few of them to rebuild the temple and the Emerald Flame was buried under tons of rubble. The threat had passed for Xylatha’s secrets had died with it and the deadly weapons were all destroyed.
Mars held many secrets and Leon, reflecting carefully on the matter, was determined this would remain one of them. Upon his return to Port Alpha he would say nothing of his adventure, for if another expedition arrived at the oasis they might, with the aid of modern science, rediscover the power of the Emerald Flame. No, both men and Martians had enough destructive weapons in their arsenals. The two worlds could do without another deadly means of killing.
The grumbling of his mount drew the weary Earthman’s gaze. It stood several yards away, and like him seemed eager to head for home. Why it had saved his life he couldn’t even begin to guess. Certainly not out of any dog-like sense of loyalty. The therem is a strange creature, and what went on in its weirdly convoluted brain was anyone’s guess.
He moved to the brute, patted it on the head in an unaccustomed display of rough affection, and nearly lost his fingers to its snapping beak.
“You bastard,” spat the Earthman as he thumped his evil natured mount on the head. It seemed things were back to normal once again.
THE END