John Norman - Marauders of Gor

The furnishings of the temple were quite splendid, gold hangings, and chains of gold, and lamps of gold, burning the finest of imported tharlarion oils.

I looked into the hungry eyes of a child, clinging in a sack to its mother's back. She kept nodding her head in prayer. The temple itself is quite large. It is some one hundred and twenty feet in length, and forty feet in width and height. Its roof, wooden-shingled, is supported on the walls, and two rows of squared pillars. On these pillars, and at places on the walls, were nailed sheets of gold. On these were inscribed prayers and invocations to the Priest-Kings. There were many candles in the sanctuary. They made the air even closer, burning the oxygen.

The high altar, of marble, setting on a platform, also marble, of three broad steps, was surmounted by a great rounded circle of gold, which is often taken as a symbol of Priest-Kings. It is without beginning or end. It stands, I suppose, for eternity. At the foot of the altar beasts were sometimes sacrificed, their horns held, their heads twisted, the blood from their opened throats caught in shallow golden bowls, to be poured upon the altar; too, choice portions of their flesh would be burnt upon the altar, the smoke escaping through a small hole in the roof.

The temple, incidentally, is orientated to the Sardar. When the High Initiate stands facing the altar, before the circle of gold, he faces the distant Sardar, the abode of Priest-Kings. He bows and prays to the distant Sardar and lifts the burned meat to the remote denizens of those mysterious mountains.

There are no pictures or representations of Priest-Kings within the temple, incidentally, or, as far as I know, elsewhere on Gor. It is regarded as blasphemy to attempt to picture a Priest-King. I suppose it is just as well. The Initiates claim they have no size or shape or form. This is incorrect but the Initiates are just as well off, I expect, in their conjectures. I speculated what a great picture of Misk might look like, hanging at the side of the table. I wondered what might become of the religion of Priest-Kings if Priest-Kings should ever choose to make themselves known to men.

I would not prophesy for it a bright future.

I looked again upon the slender, blondish girl, bored in the crowd. Again she looked at me, and looked away. She was richly dressed. The cape of white fur was a splendid fur. The scarlet vest, the blouse of white wool, the long woollen skirt, red, were fine goods. The buckle from Cos was expensive. Even the shoes of black leather were finely tooled. I supposed her the daughter of a rich merchant.

There were other good looking wenches, too, in the crowd, generally blond girls, as are most of the northern girls, many with braided hair. They were in festival finery. This was holiday in Kassau. Ivar Forkbeard, in death, if not in life, was making pilgrimage to the temple, that his bones might be anointed at the hands of the High Initiate, would he so graciously deign to do so. This word had been brought from the wharves to the High Initiate. He had, in his mercy, granted this request. The hollow bars on their great chains, hanging from timber frames outside the temple, had been struck. Word had been spread. Ivar Forkbeard, the unregenerate, the raider, the pirate, he who had dared to make the fist of the hammer over his ale, would come at last, in death if not in life, humbly to the temple of Priest-Kings. There was much rejoicing in Kassau.

In the crowd, with the poor, were many burghers of Kassau, stout men of means, the pillars of the town, with their families. Several of these stood on raised platforms, on the right, near the front of the temple. I understood these places to be reserved for dignitaries, men of substance and their families.

I examined the younger women on the platform. None, it seemed to me, was as excellent as the slender blond girl in the cape of white sea-sleen fur and scarlet vest. One was, however, not without interest. She was a tall, statuesque girl, lofty and proud, grey-eyed. She wore black and silver, a full, ankle-length gown of rich, black velvet, with silver belts, or straps, that crossed over her breasts, and tied about her waist. From it, by strings, hung a silver purse, that seemed weighty. Her blond hair was lifted from the sides and back of her head by a comb of bone and leather, like an inverted isosceles triangle, the comb fastened by a tiny black ribbon about her neck and another such ribbon about her forehead. Her cloak, of black fur, from the black sea sleen, glossy and deep, swirled to her ankles. It was fastened by a large circular brooch of silver, probably from Tharna. She was doubtless the daughter of a very rich man. She would have many suitors.

I looked again to the High Initiate, a cold, stern, dour man, hard faced, who sat in his high, white hat in his robes upon the throne within the white rail.

Within that rail, above the altar, some in chests, others displayed on shelvings, was much rich plate, and vessels of gold and silver. There were the golden bowls used to gather the blood of the sacrificed animals; cups to pour libations to the Priest-Kings; vessels containing oils; lavers in which the celebrants of the rites might cleanse their hands from their work; there were even the small bowls of coins, brought as offerings by the poor, to solicit the favor of initiates that they might intercede with Priest-Kings on their behalf, that the food crops would not fail, the suls not rot, the fish come to the plankton, the verr yield her kid with health to both, the vulos lay many eggs.

How hard to me, and cruel, seemed the face of the High Initiate. How rich they were, the initiates, and how little they did. The peasant tilled his fields, the fisherman went out in his boat, the merchant risked his capital. But the initiate did none of these things. Rather he lived by exploiting the superstitions and fears of simpler men. I had little doubt but that the High Initiate had long seen through his way of life, if he had not at first. Surely now he was no simple novice. But he had not changed his way of life. He had not gone to the fields, nor to the fishing banks, nor to the market. He had remained in the temple. I studied his face. It was not that of a simple man, or that of a fool. I had little doubt that the initiate knew full well what he was doing. I had little doubt but what he knew that he knew as little as others of Priest-Kings, and was as ignorant as others. And yet still he sat upon his throne, in the gilded temple, amid the incense, the ringing of the sistrum, the singing of boys.

The child in the sack on the mother's back whimpered. "Be silent," she whispered to it. "Be silent!"

Then, from outside, rang once the great hollow bar, hanging on its chain.

Inside, the initiates, and the boys, at a sign from the High Initiate, a lifted, claw-like hand, were silent.

Then the initiate rose from his throne, and went slowly to the altar and climbed the steps. He bowed thrice to the Sardar and then turned to face the congregation.

"Let them enter the palace of Priest-Kings," he said.

I now heard the singing, the chanting, of initiates from outside the door. Twelve of them had gone down to the ship, with candles, to escort the body of Ivar Forkbeard to the temple. Two now entered, holding candles. All eyes craned to see the procession which now, slowly, the initiates singing, entered the incense-filled temple.

Four huge men of Torvaldsland, in long cloaks, clasped about their necks, heads down, bearded, with braided hair, entered, bearing on their shoulders a platform of crossed spears. On this platform, covered with a white shroud, lay a body, a large body. Ivar Forkbeard, I thought to myself, must have been a large man.

"I want to see him," whispered the blond girl to the woman with whom she stood.

"Be silent," hushed the woman.