Tal Goreans,
Greetings visitors,

Welcome once again to the Booknotes column. In this issue we break new ground, opening the covers of Volume Three, "Priest-Kings of Gor". The cover of my present (Ballantine) copy of this features a dramatic picture of a loincloth-clad red-haired man standing over the supine body of a generic damsel in distress, his back to the reader as he confronts the looming figure of a bizarre monster with a golden carapace, luminous eyes, a savage pair of pincer-like mandibles, and legs that look as though they belong to a rhinoceros or some squat dinosaur, certainly nothing insectoid. On the other hand, perhaps this picture gives away less of the true nature of the Priest-Kings than did the cover of my original copy of this book, which was the UK edition by Star Books and whose black jacket was adorned with this same red-haired man engaged in a life-or-death struggle with a giant golden... but perhaps I’m saying too much here. All in good time.

Chapter One

Tarl Cabot arrives at the Sardar astride his tarn, Ubar of the Skies, but he already knows from "Outlaw of Gor" (see previous issue) that he cannot fly over the Priest-Kings’ stronghold itself, and so he lands outside, near the Sardar Fair, and bids the tarn begone. It, the loyal creature, does not wish to leave him, and the ensuing parting upsets Tarl. He has business at the Fair itself before going to see the Priest-Kings, for he has the manuscript of "Outlaw" to deliver to one of the Caste of Scribes, confident in the knowledge that sooner or later, cared for by this Scribe, it will be picked up by someone who will deliver it to Earth.

Norman intrudes in a footnote here, perpetuating for the last time the fiction that the Gor stories are written by Tarl Cabot and delivered to a mutual friend, Harrison Smith. Henceforth he will stay out of the spotlight entirely, barring a very occasional mention of himself.

Tarl takes the occasion to introduce the reader to the Sardar Fairs, which represent one of the few places and times where the perpetual enmity between different Gorean cities is put aside, allowing goods and ideas to be exchanged on neutral territory and the Merchant Law to be standardised - and this is the only international law on Gor. All Goreans must visit the Sardar before they reach the age of 25, but the holy nature of this pilgrimage does not grant any kind of sanctuary to the would-be pilgrims, who are often attacked and enslaved en route to the Sardar. They may even end up being sold at the Fair, within sight of the Sardar they meant to visit; and Tarl shows us some newly-collared kajirae who have suffered exactly this fate, "numbly" (Tarl’s own word) saying "Buy me, Master".

Musing pityingly on the fate of those who thought to visit the Sardar as pilgrims and who would leave as slaves, Tarl reflects on the power of the Priest-Kings, thinking of the messenger he met on the road to Ko-ro-ba whose brain the Priest-Kings burned out by some unknown means, the destruction of Ko-ro-ba itself, and the loss of his beloved Talena. Grimly he muses: "Yes, I have business with the Priest-Kings of Gor."

Chapter Two

Tarl provisions himself for the forthcoming journey and finds a Scribe to hand his manuscript over to, confident that, though they do not know each other and the writing itself is incomprehensible to the Scribe, it will be taken good care of (and it was, or we would not have read "Outlaw", would we?). He then approaches the enormous gate that is the only way into the Sardar. It is guarded by a solemn Initiate, who of course has seen it all before: idealists looking for enlightenment, invalids hoping for a cure, seekers of immortality, outlaws with no other refuge. He doesn’t ask Tarl’s business, beyond an assurance that Tarl does know what it is he is asking for; and washing his hands symbolically, he orders a team of blinded slaves to open the massive gate. This is dreadfully hard work and Tarl, considerate to a fault, cries enough and slips through as soon as he can. A chime-bar mournfully signals his entry and the gate shuts silently behind him.

He finds himself on a path that is well-trodden and adorned by graffiti, some a thousand years old to judge by the lettering and ranging through wit to philosophy to rage at the Priest-Kings and simple homely messages. For four days he crosses barren rock until he hears a familiar animal noise, the roar of a larl. He briefly tells us enough about larls to be going on with - large feline carnivores which are to Gor much as the tiger is to Earth, but seven feet high at the shoulder and with a rather triangular, almost viper-like, head. Since there is no sign of any game for this larl to live on, Tarl concludes it must be a Priest-King’s larl and he is impressed that they are able to tame it, for no man ever has.

Admiring or not, Tarl is going to have to kill the animal to pass it. This, Tarl tells us, is normally a job for a whole file of hunters, each taking it in turns to spear it until it is the turn of the Last Spear, who must stand and fight the wounded beast if he and his fellows have not finished it off by then, letting the others flee while he gets torn limb from limb. Larl-hunting is a dangerous pastime, and Tarl once asked a larl-hunter why anyone bothered, receiving the following reply:

"Because it is beautiful and dangerous, and because we are Goreans."

Tarl’s planning is interrupted when, much to his discomfiture, he hears the sound of a second larl. It is manifestly impossible to kill two larls with one spear, and nearly as hard to kill one with a single cast and the other with only his sword; but resolving to try, Tarl seizes his spear, more annoyed at the prospect of not seeing the Priest-Kings than afraid for his life; and he springs upon the yet-unseen beasts with the war-cry of Ko-ro-ba on his lips.

Chapter Three

He is confronted, not by the sight of a little old man with a couple of gramophones and some complaint about how he’d have got away with it if it wasn’t for those meddling kids and their dog, but by something nearly as strange: a pair of huge white larls tethered by neck-chains. Seeing that he is out of their reach, Tarl holds back his spear. These giant animals are bright for larls too, as Tarl finds out when one of them flings itself backwards at him, gaining enough reach to kick him within range of the other, a sticky situation that Tarl escapes with a few scratches and the loss of most of his clothing. This is severe enough, as the night-chill will kill him unless he can find shelter; but now the larls’ chains are winched in by some hidden agency.

A big stone door opens in dramatic silence and a small, bald, whiskered, red-faced man in Initiate’s robes appears. He has a tobacco-pipe, the first Tarl has seen on this world: Goreans do not smoke, their nearest equivalent vice being the chewing of kanda leaves. Tarl finds the man likeable but a most implausible Priest-King; he looks more like an Englishman, whether a roguish 18th-century squire, an eccentric 19th-century bookseller or an affable 20th-century professor (in his imagining of which, Cabot seems to believe that gout is a preserve of the affluent, a notion I’d like to disabuse him of). One unusual feature is the little man’s red eye-pupils, and he seems briefly annoyed when Tarl notices them.

Putting the annoyance aside he says "We have been waiting for you" and calls Tarl by name. His own name is Parp, and shrugging, Parp says "It’s not much of a name for a Priest-King, but then I’m not much of a Priest-King." This causes Tarl to ask him directly if he is a Priest-King and Parp looks annoyed again before answering "Of course."

But though this reply causes Tarl to tell us that it seemed as though his heart had stopped beating, one of the larls outside roars and Parp seems terrified, which Tarl finds odd. Parp disappears down the passage expecting Tarl to follow, and he duly does so.

Chapter Four

As the portal behind closes, Tarl follows the pipe-smoking Parp down a passage lit by energy bulbs, the whole betokening no higher command of technology than, for instance, Marlenus’s tunnel under the walls of Ar (see "Tarnsman"). It is unornamented, suggesting that the Priest-Kings scorn such frivolity; but it is a well-worn passageway, hinting at countless men and women passing this way before. They enter a far more impressive feat of architecture: a thousand-yard-wide dome, the sky showing through its transparent ceiling. The dome houses only a dais and a throne, to which Parp goes, pointing out a place for Tarl to stand while he, Parp, ascends the throne. Parp remarks that he thinks the throne would be better for a cushion, but he politely agrees with Tarl’s opinion that a cushion would be out of place.

Once he is comfortably settled, and has lit his pipe with what Tarl briefly mistook for a weapon, and indeed has smoked it and is getting on with a second pipe, Parp lets the audience commence, but will entertain nothing but small talk. Tarl, who wants to discuss larger matters such as his father, his city, and Talena, becomes enraged, and almost flings his spear at the irritating Parp. He holds back, not being a murderer; and Parp indulgently shows that no such weapon could have hurt him, letting Tarl throw his spear to see it reduced to charred and molten fragments by some invisible heat shield. Angrily, Tarl concedes his helplessness but says that if Parp wants his sword he will have to take it.

Parp, however, professes uninterest, but he begins to seem ill at ease. Having previously said "We are waiting," he now claims that this was only a figure of speech and that he is the only Priest-King. He shivers again at the larl’s distant roar and abruptly terminates the interview when a gong sounds in the distance. He says that Tarl is his guest "until it is time for you to be destroyed", his eyes glow red, and he dashes behind the throne and vanishes.

Tarl can find no sign of a secret exit but is confident that Parp, the riddle of his eyes aside, is but flesh and blood and so must have used one. He ascends the throne and sits on it with his drawn sword across his knees, laughing a warrior’s laugh; and at this cinematic moment, as the camera pans to show us through the clear ceiling the three moons shining out of the starry night sky above, then zooms out giving a long shot of Tarl fearlessly laughing on the throne of Priest-Kings under that mighty dome, and some stirring music plays in the background (Zadok the Priest would be just the thing)... at this moment we leave Tarl here until next time.