Mercenaries of Gor

20 We See the City of Ar

"When we come over the crest of this hill," called the driver, "you will see Ar."

Boabissia rose from her seat to stand by the front railing of the fee cart. She clutched it with both her hands.

"Move, move aside," called the driver to some of the pedestrians on the road. The sun was on our left. The hill was steep. There were few wagons drawn up along the road here. If they were halted, it seemed they had chosen to halt on the far side of the hill, where, at rest, they might see the city.

A woman, with a pack on her back, stumbled, and then regained her feet, hurrying along the side of the road.

"Ah!" cried Boabissia. "Ohh!"

More than one of the passengers rose to their feet, standing near the benches. The driver halted the fee cart at the crest of the hill.

I had seen Ar at various times before. Such a sight I was accustomed to. It would not move me, as it might others, the first time to look upon it.

"Incredible!" said a man.

"Marvelous!" whispered another.

I smiled at their childish enthusiasm, at their lack of maturity. Then I rose, too, to my feet. I saw then, in the distance, some four or five pasangs away, the gleaming walls of glorious Ar.

"I had not realized how vast was the city," said one of the men.

"It is large," said another fellow.

"There is the Central Cylinder! said a man, pointing.

The high, uprearing walls of the city, some hundred feet or more in height, the sun bright upon them, stretched into the distance. They were now white. That had been done, apparently, since the time of Cernus, the usurper, and the restoration of Marlenus, ubar of ubars. It was hard to look at them, for the glare upon them. We could see the great gate, too, and the main road leading to it, the Viktel Aria. Indeed, we ourselves, soon, I thought, would transfer to the Viktel Aria. Within the gamut of those gleaming walls, so lofty and mighty, rose thousands of buildings, and a veritable forest of ascendant towers, of diverse heights and colors. Many of these towers, I knew, were joined by traceries of soaring bridges, set at different levels. These bridges, however, save for tiny glintings here and there, could not be well made out at this distance.

"I do not think I have ever seen anything so beautiful," said a man.

We were looking upon what was doubtless the greatest city of known Gor.

"I did not know it was like that," said another man.

I remembered the great gate. I remembered, long ago, the horde of Pa-Kur. I did not forget the house of Cernus, the Stadium of Tarns, the great tarn, Ubar of the Skies, the racing factions, the Stadium of Blades, the bloodied sands of the arena. I had not forgotten the streets, the baths, the shops, the broad, noble avenues, with their fountains, the narrow, twisting streets, little more than darkened corridors, shielded from the sun, of the lower districts.

"I have never seen anything like it," said a man.

"Nor I," said another, in awe.

I gazed upon the city. In such places came together the complexities and the poverties, the elementalities and the richnesses of the worlds. In such places were to be found the rare, precious habitats of culture, the astonishing, moving delights of art and music, the truths of theater and literature, the glories and allegories of architecture, bespeaking the meanings of peoples, man-made symbols like mountain ranges; in them, too, were to be found iron and silver, and gold and steel, the chairs of finance and the thrones of power. I gazed at the shining city. How startling it seemed. Such places were like magnets to man; they call to him like gilded sirens; they lure him inward to their dazzling wonders, bewitching him with their often so meretricious whispered promises; they were symbols of races. In them were fortunes to be sought, and fortunes to be won, and fortunes to be lost; in them there were crowds, and loneliness, in them success trod the same pavements as failure; in their plazas hope jostled with despair, and meaning ate at the same table with meaninglessness. In such places were perhaps the best and worst that man could do, his past and future, his pain and pleasure, his darkness and light, come together in a single focus.

"Drink, cool drinks!" called a woman, selling juices by the side of the road, coming up to the cart. There was a mall crowd at the crest of the hill. It was a place where carts, and wagons, and travelers often stopped. In such a place there were coins to be made. She paid no attention to the sight below. Doubtless she had seen it a thousand times. Her eyes were on possible customers.

"Would you like a drink?" I asked Boabissia.

"Yes," she said.

I purchased her some larma juice for a tarsk bit.

"Is it cool?" I asked.

"Yes," she said. The morning was hot.

It would have been stored overnight, I assumed, in an amphora, buried to the neck in the cool earth. Sometimes Earth girls, first brought to Gor, do not understand why so many of these two-handled, narrow-necked vessels have such a narrow, usually pointed base, for they cannot stand upright on such a base. They have not yet learned that these vessels are not intended to stand upright. Rather they are commonly fitted into a storage hole, buried there to keep their contents cool, the necks above the earth. The pointed base, of course, presses into the soft earth at the bottom of the storage hole.

"Bread, meat!" called a fellow, coming up beside the cart. Several of us availed ourselves of his provender. I bought some wedges of Sa-Tarna bread and slices of dried tarsk meat, taking some and giving the rest to Boabissia and Hurtha. I also went to the back of the cart, to the baggage area where I kept Feiqa. I gave her some of my bread and meat. I did not permit her to touch it with her hands, but, reaching between the thick wooden bars, some six inches apart, to where she knelt among the packs and boxes at the back, fed her by hand. "Thank you, Master," she said.

I then returned to the front of the cart. Some of the passengers had alighted. I regarded again the walls of glorious Ar, shining in the distance.

"I cannot wait," said Boabissia, "to claim my patrimony."

I nodded. I finished my food.

"Let us return to the cart!" the driver called to some of the fellows who had alighted. "Let us return to the cart!"

I looked again upon the city in the distance. From here it looked very beautiful. Yet I knew that somewhere within it, perhaps within its crowded quarters, from which mobs might erupt like floods, or within its sheltered patios and gardens, where high ladies might exchange gossip, sip nectars and toy with dainty repasts, served to them by male silk slaves, or among its houses and towers, or on its streets or in the great baths, that somewhere there, somewhere behind those walls, was treason. Somewhere there, within those walls, coiled in the darkness of secrecy, corruption and sedition, like serpents, I was sure, awaited their hour to strike.

"It is a fine sight," said a fellow, climbing up through the cart gate, and standing beside me for a moment, to look down on the city.

"Yes," I said.

He returned to his place.

From where we were, of course, we could not see dirt and crime, or poverty or hunger. We could not detect pain, misery and greed. We could not feel loneliness and woe. And yet, for all these things, which so afflict so many of its own, how impressive is the city. How precious it must be, that so many men are willing to pay its price. I wondered why this was, I a voyager and soldier, more fond of the tumultuous sea and the wind-swept field than the street and plaza. Perhaps because it is alive, like drums and trumpets. To be near it or within it, to be stirred by its life, to call its cylinders their own, is for many reward enough. The last fellow, climbing up and closing the gate behind him, took his seat.

I did not take my eyes from the city, so splendid before us. Yes, I thought, it is all there, the habitats of culture, the intricate poetries of stone, the incredible places where, their heads among clouds, common bricks have been taught to speak and sing, the meanings uttered scarcely understood by those who walk among them; yes it is all there, in them, in the cities, I thought; in them were dirt and crime, iron and silver, gold and steel; in them were perfume and silk, and whips and chains; in them were love and lust' in them were mastery and submission, the owning and the helplessly being owned' in them were intrigue and greed, nobility and honor, deceit and treachery, the exalted and the base, the strong and the weak. In such places, filthy, and crowded and frail, are found the fortresses of man. They are castles and prisons, arenas and troves, they are cities; they are the citadels of civilization.

The driver called to his tharlarion and shook the reins.

"Ahead!" he called to the beast. "Move!"

I returned to my seat, the cart beginning to move.

"You have seen Ar before?" said a man.

"Yes," I said.

"It is then an old thing for you," he said.

"Yes," I said.

"You will have to forgive me," he said. "But I found it quite astonishing, this first time."

"It often affects one that way, the first time," I said.

"I suppose so," he said.

The cart continued to move down the incline. I noted the sound of the narrow, metal-rimmed wheels on the stones. I watched the walls of Ar grow closer.