Warlord of Kor | Page 2

dart from a dark wall across the floor to another shadow, its feet soundless
in the dust.
Above Rynason the enormous arch of the Hirlaji dome loomed darkly against the deep
cerulean blue of the sky. The lines of all Hirlaji architecture were deceptively simple, but
Rynason had already found that if he tried to follow the curves and angles he would soon
find his head swimming. There was a quality to these ancient buildings which was not
quite understandable to a Terran mind, as though the old Hirlaji had built them on
geometric principles just slightly at a tangent from those of Earth. The curve of the arch
drew Rynason's eyes along its silhouette almost hypnotically. He caught himself, and
shook his head, and turned again to the alien before him.
The creature's name, as well as it could be rendered in a Terran script, was Horng. The
head of the alien was dark and hairless, leathery, weathered; the light wires of the
interpreter trailed down and across the floor from where they were clamped to the deep
indentations of the temples. Massive boney ridges circled the shadowed eyes set low on
the head, directly above the wide mouth which always hung open while the Hirlaji
breathed in long gulps of air. Two atrophied nostrils were situated on either side and
slightly below the eyes. The neck was so thick and massive that it was practically
nonexistent, blending the head with the shoulders and trunk, on which the dry skin
stretched so thin that Rynason could see the solid bone of the chest wall. Two squat arms
hung from the shoulders, terminating in four-digited hands on which two sets of blunt
fingers were opposed; Horng kept moving them constantly, in what Rynason
automatically interpreted as a nervous habit. The lower body was composed of two
heavily-muscled legs jointed so that they could move either forward or backward, and the
feet had four stubby but powerful toes radiating from the center. The Hirlaji wore a dark
garment of something which looked like wood-fibre, hanging from the head and gathered
together by a cord just below the chest-wall.
Rynason, since arriving on the planet three weeks before as one of a team of fifteen
archaeological workers, had been interviewing Horng almost every day, but still he often
found himself remembering only with difficulty that this was an intelligent being; Horng
was so slow-moving and uncommunicative most of the time that he almost seemed like a
mound of leather, like a pile of hides thrown together in a corner. But he was intelligent,
and in his mind he held perhaps the entire history of his race.
Rynason lifted the interpreter-mike again. "Was Tebron Marl king of all Hirlaj?"
Horng's eyes slowly closed and opened. TEBRON MARL WAS RULER LEADER IN
THE REGION OF MINES. HE UNITED ALL OF HIRLAJ AND WAS PRIEST
RULER.
"How did he unite the planet?"
TEBRON LIVED AT THE END OF THE BARBARIC AGE. HE CONQUERED THE
PLANET BY VIOLENCE AND DROVE THE ANCIENT PRIEST CASTE FROM THE
TEMPLE.

"But the reign of Tebron Marl is remembered as an era of peace."
WHEN HE WAS PRIEST KING HE HELD THE PEACE. HE ENDED THE
BARBARIC AGE.
Rynason suddenly sat forward, watching the stylus record these words. "Then it was
Tebron who abolished war on Hirlaj?"
YES.
Rynason felt a thrill go through him. This was what they had all been searching for--the
point in the history of Hirlaj when wars had ceased, when the Hirlaji had given
themselves over to completely peaceful living. He knew already that the transition had
been sharp and sudden. It was the last question mark in the sketchy history of Hirlaj
which the survey team had compiled since its arrival--how had the Hirlaji managed so
abruptly to establish and maintain an era of peace which had lasted unbroken to the
present?
It was difficult even to think of these huge, slow-moving creatures as warriors ... but
warriors they had been, for thousands of their years, gradually building their culture and
science until, apparently almost overnight, the wars had ceased. Since then the Hirlaji
moved in their slow way through their world, growing more complacent with the passage
of ancient generations, growing passive, and, eventually, decadent. Now there were only
some two dozen of the race left alive.
They were telepathic, these leathery aliens, and behind those shadowed eyes they held the
entire memories of their race. Experiences communicated telepathically through the
centuries had formed a memory pool which each of the remaining Hirlaji shared. They
could not, of course, integrate in their own minds all of that immense store of memories
and understand it all clearly ... but the memories were there.
It was at the same time a boon and a trial for