Finally, the soldiers turned the captives over to seven and eight-foot giants. They were armored, dull-eyed humanoids with a peculiar physical characteristic.

  “Do you notice their tiny heads?” Dravek asked Maddox.

  Maddox nodded. How could he have missed it? Despite their towering stature and impressive muscular development, their grotesquely small heads made the giants grimly unique.

  Most of the men referred to the giants as pinheads…when the little heads weren’t listening. The giants’ leather helmets made their craniums seem even smaller, as it pressed the hair down. Regular men in black police garb with pistols told the pinhead giants what to do. The doglike beasts remained, watching the captives as if they were their personal prey animals.

  The mountainous jungle terrain changed over time. The wilderness faded and turned into hilly orchards with fruit trees and watery fields of razor rice. In other areas, rows upon rows of giant frond trees with huge flowers were home to hordes of buzzing bees. The deadly creatures were busily collecting nectar, no doubt to turn it into the irreplaceable longevity honey.

  There were a few wooden houses and villages along the way. Twice, the line of captives spotted naked toiling slaves working in the fields. The first time, the slaves wielded mattocks, hacking at the ground, preparing it possibly. The slaves had been burned a deep brown by the sun, many with blisters. They looked dispirited but moved nimbly enough when an overseer cracked an electric whip.

  The second time, the slaves wore a leather harness on their heads, the bundle of supplies supported by their backs. They carried obscenely heavy loads, many staggering under the weight of gathered fruit.

  They were as naked as the first group, and they filed near the captives in glum silence.

  “Maddox,” Dravek said. “Do you see?”

  Maddox frowned. He’d seen. He couldn’t believe it. What a hateful land.

  “The slaves…” Dravek whispered in horror. “They’ve been gelded. None of them possessed any family jewels.”

  A few of the legion captives vomited, perhaps understanding the same ugly fate could well await each of them.

  The march took on a surreal quality after that. Maddox pondered. If the Honey Men did that to their captives—he planned to escape no matter what it took.

  Perhaps the dog-beasts understood that or felt an underlying difference, as they watched the captives even more closely than before.

  Maddox became grimmer as the days progressed. He would have tried for the forest at the beginning if he’d known this. Would the Honey Men geld all their captives? How could he find out? Dare he ask a guard? He doubted asking a giant would render any answer.

  Toward the end of the sixth day, the giants herded them faster. Endless marching, little sleep and barely enough food to keep them alive and the little rainwater they could catch with their mouths had taken a hard toll on the captives. There were three hundred stumbling and staggering wretches as the giants herded them into towering wooden walls, a corral.

  Gates closed behind the wretches. Electricity flowed on top from wires coiled there. A man-sized chute opened at the far end of the corral. The chute led into a large wooden building.

  “The first man, come through,” a voice said through a loudspeaker high up on the building’s nearest wall.

  A man in soiled military gear gingerly poked his head through the chute. Huge hands grabbed him from within the building and dragged him all the way in.

  The chute banged shut, barring anyone else from entering.

  The milling wretches in the corral, those yet awake, listened carefully. It took time. Then a scream sounded—a lost and forlorn sound. It ended soon enough. A few men claimed to hear sobbing.

  “What do you think that means?” Dravek asked.

  Maddox’s eyes had narrowed. Sleep deprivation had made him groggy and sour-tempered. Yet, he was also hyper-alert, if that made sense. “We have to escape.”

  “This seems like a bad time to try it.”

  “Not trying will be worse.”

  “Yeah,” Dravek said, as he rubbed his red eyes, perhaps forcing himself to remain awake. “How do we fight giants, though?”

  Maddox glanced at this right boot. The monofilament blade was still there. No one had ever checked to take it.

  “Can you hack through a corral wall?” Dravek asked.

  “I doubt effectively. We’ll charge together through the chute when it opens.”

  “Should we barge up in line to try the next time?”

  Maddox found it hard to make his mind work properly. He was missing something. Then it came to him. “No. The Honey Men will expect something now. We’ll sleep first and regain some energy. We’ll wait until the end when everything has become dull routine.”

  “Do you think you can sleep knowing what’s coming?”

  Maddox pulled one of Dravek’s arms, guiding him to the back of the corral. There, he lay down and closed his eyes. He heard Dravek lay down near him.

  Worries surged through Maddox. He was a long way from home. It seemed impossible that he’d ever see Meta or Jewel again. He closed his eyes and used the Way of the Pilgrim breathing. It calmed his raw nerves and eased the horrible clench in the pit of his stomach. The coming ordeal…

  “Help me, God,” Maddox prayed. “Help me fight as hard as I can when the moment arrives.”

  He swallowed the lump in his throat. He wanted more children. He wanted a son. If he were ever going to gain that—

  Maddox breathed in the Way of the Pilgrim, stilling his anxieties. He’d cast them onto God. Now, he forced himself to relax, and by slow degrees, the edge softened, and he fell asleep.

  His dreams were hard and unsettling. There was a force watching him, a telepathic entity. In his dream, it wasn’t the Entity from the ice moon out by the gas giant. This was something else. It was here—

  Here? On Gath in the South Pole region?

  The thought stirred Maddox’s sleep. With a start, he opened his eyes. He remembered where he was and what was happening.

  “The chute has opened,” Dravek said.

  Maddox sat up. Everyone else was gone, processed through the chute. It was their turn to face grim reality.

  “Are you ready?” Maddox asked.

  “No. Are you?”

  Maddox stretched his arms and headed resolutely for the chute. “We go together, remember?”

  “I do.” Dravek was right behind him. “Let’s fight to the death, brother.”

  “Even better,” Maddox said, “let’s win.”

  -37-

  The chute loomed before Maddox. The Honey Men meant to make him an obedient worker. They would transfer him into a docile slave by castration and endless punishment.

  Maddox snarled silently as he ducked his head through the chute, drew the monofilament blade, and charged.

  Dravek dove through on his heels as the chute slammed shut behind them.

  Two bored eight-foot giants waited inside a chamber. They wore gloves and indifference as they reached for Maddox.

  Then the fact of Dravek rolling into the room as well penetrated their dull brains. That brought wicked delight to their eyes.

  Maddox had already started moving. He sliced the huge hand reaching for him, the monofilament blade easily parting leather, flesh and bones.

  The giant bawled with pain and surprise, jerking his ruined hand away.

  Maddox leapt at the giant, stabbing into the vitals and sawing. It was brutal and gory, and highly effective.

  The second giant squealed angrily as Dravek dodged him. The first giant was swaying as he clutched at his slashed stomach, trying to keep everything in and failing badly.

  Maddox was charging the second giant, who had concentrated on Dravek. From behind, Maddox hacked at the back of the knees, severing tendons, muscle, fat and gristle.

  The second giant gave a hoot of surprise, twisted around to grab the gnat bothering him and lost his balance due to his ruined knees. He crashed back onto the floor.

  “Dravek,” Maddox hissed.

  Maddox was already charging the door at the end of the room. Dravek hurried after him. The giants bellowed and raved, both on the floor. One bled out. The other crawled after the two.

  The door opened.

  Maddox stabbed the man on the other side, a lean individual wearing a bloody apron. A second man, a helper working the obscene machine in the room, looked up in surprise. He was a muscular sort and had depraved features.

  “What are you doing?” the second man said.

  The man with the bloody apron was dead on the floor, no longer possessing a throat.

  Dravek charged through and blanched at the sight of the machine. It was meant to hold a prisoner, stretching his legs apart. There was a cutting tool on a bendable arm and a bloody sink below with a large opening. Clearly, whatever these two cut from a man dropped into the sink and opening, disappearing forever.

  Outrage filled Maddox. He charged the muscular man.

  “No,” the man said, leaping for a button on the wall.

  He didn’t reach it, as Maddox leaped upon him from behind, bearing him down onto the floor. Probably, Maddox should have kept the man alive to question him. Instead, Maddox grabbed the head and twisted brutally, snapping the neck so the other gurgled.

  Maddox rose panting, aware that he’d dropped the knife. He picked it up.

  “Now what do we do?” Dravek asked.

  There was a second door in the other direction of the first. It surely led to wherever the freshly gelded prisoner would go next. Whoever was in that room wouldn’t expect hardy men, but a vilely maimed prisoner weakened from his ordeal.

  “Right,” Maddox said. “Are you ready?”

  “Let’s do this, brother.”

  Maddox opened the door and surged through. Three men waited in tired boredom. Some of their leather clothes had bloodstains. They looked up, their brains working sluggishly so they didn’t instantly realize what was taking place.

  By then, Maddox was among them. He didn’t hesitate or show mercy. He used the knife with expert skill, killing fast and sure. Each dropped to the floor, dead.

  Now, there were two doors to choose from.

  Dravek was already at one, cracking it open and peering through. It led to a hallway. He noted a bloodstain here and there on the walls. Closing the door, Dravek went to the next one. It also led into a hallway, this one carpeted and with pleasant odors.

  Dravek closed the door and waited. When Maddox looked at him, Dravek pointed at that door.

  Maddox hurried to him.

  “This must lead to the guardroom or whatever,” Dravek whispered. “The other door leads to degradation.”

  “Open the guard door.”

  Dravek did.

  Maddox burst into the hallway, striding fast and with deadly purpose. He reached another door, going through and entering a locker room. Maddox sliced open each locker.

  He and Dravek changed into Honey Men gear. Each hefted a pistol, a chemical slug-thrower. As they laced their new boots, an alarm began to ring.

  The two exchanged glances.

  “Glad we have these,” Dravek said, raising his pistol.

  “I’m not surrendering,” Maddox said.

  “Neither am I.”

  “Balls to the firewall,” Maddox said.

  “Yeah. Literally.”

  Maddox went to a wall and used the monofilament blade. He cut a hole and opened a way into a larger room. Squeezing through, he waited for Dravek. Then, the two walked across, heading for a pair of doors.

  “Act calm,” Maddox said. His intuitive sense told him this was an unexpected path. He reached a door and tried it. It was unlocked. He swung it open and stepped outside.

  The alarm was still ringing.

  “We’re doing it,” Dravek said. “You’re a genius.”

  Maddox started walking again, heading for ferns two hundred feet away. As he did, an armored car halted and a machine gun bolt slammed home.

  “Don’t look at it,” Maddox said.

  “Halt,” a man in the armored car commanded.

  “It’s Mr. Red Robe,” Dravek said. “I know. I shouldn’t have looked, but I did.”

  Maddox turned as he continued walking. Dravek was walking with him. A military man was at the heavy machine gun. Mr. Red Robe poked his head out of an armored-car hatch.

  “Halt,” Mr. Red Robe said again.

  Maddox burst into a sprint. It surprised everyone, including Dravek. Maddox dodged, and a red ray beamed past him. Maddox didn’t bother firing at Mr. Red Robe, as he recalled the personal force field.

  Behind him, Dravek collapsed onto the ground.

  The machine gun fired a burst, its tracers burning past Maddox. He ignored them. If they cut him down, they cut him down. Better to die free and whole than live as a castrated slave.

  “You have demonstrated courage,” Mr. Red Robe shouted. “You have changed your destiny by it.”

  Maddox put on another burst of his unique speed. The red beam flashed behind him. Maddox knew he was going to make it. He leapt high, knowing another beam was coming. If he leapt high enough—no, it didn’t prove high enough. The red beam struck him this time. Maddox lost consciousness as he felt himself falling, falling into dark oblivion.

  -38-

  Maddox awoke by degrees. He felt groggy and stiff. What had happened to him? Then he remembered. He felt between his legs.

  “It’s still there,” a half-familiar voice said. “You redeemed yourself in the end.”

  Maddox opened his eyes. He lay on a cot in a small cell. Dravek slept on a mat on the floor. Standing by the bars of the cell—

  Maddox’s eyes widened.

  Primus Centurion Hern stood here. He wore leather garb and crisscrossing straps. He still had his gorilla physique and hard, merciless eyes. His big hands gripped the bars. He didn’t wear a military hat. It showed that he had a half a head of short hair because he was balding. That matched his brutal countenance and tough features.

  “You’re alive,” Maddox said, as he sat up. His head spun and his muscles felt stiffer than they’d ever been, as far as he could remember.

  “And you still have your balls,” Hern said. “Imagine that.”

  Maddox frowned. “I don’t understand.”

  “Gallant Ophir didn’t explain it to you?”

  “Who?”

  “The red-robed man with the ruby rings,” Hern said. “He’s Gallant Ophir.”

  “Is Gallant a title?”

  Hern nodded. “He owns us. We’re his gladiators. Well, you’re a gladiator-in-training, but who knows?”

  “How did you come to be here?”

  “I resisted in a tight spot. I proved my courage. That’s important to the Honey Men.”

  Maddox thought back to when the Honey Men had forced the surviving legionnaires to surrender. “You mean this Ophir rewarded your surly behavior?”

  “He rewarded my courage,” Hern said.

  “What about the four soldiers who fired at him?”

  “They died during gladiatorial training.”

  Maddox processed the information.

  “The training is tough,” Hern added.

  “How exactly did the others die?”

  Hern sneered with an evil light in his eyes. “How do you think?”

  “You killed them?”

  “It was either that, die by their sword or become a field worker. One of them chose to become a worker. You might choose that, too, if you lose your courage.”

  Maddox ignored the insult. “You think this Gallant Ophir will force us to fight each other during practice?”

  “Does that frighten you?”

  Maddox stared at Hern. “Not in the least.”

  Hern shifted uncomfortably. “I could have slain you in your sleep.”

  “That you didn’t means there’s a harsh penalty for doing so.”

  “Yeah,” Hern said. “Death.”

  That made sense. “I’m curious. What do you have against me?”

  “You’re an upstart, and you spoke against Tribune Culain. That irked me. Your manner here I now find offensive.”

  “Yet you and I arrived at the gladiatorial school. This Gallant Ophir must appreciate stubborn valor and cunning.”

  “He appreciates winners.”

  “That explains Dravek and me. I don’t see how it has anything to do with you.”

  Hern scowled. “I was the Primus Centurion of Legion Culain. Can you comprehend how good I had to be to acquire the post?”

  The man had a point. Maddox acknowledged it. “You know how to fight. There’s no doubt about that. You can also maintain discipline. Yes, you’re a soldier, Hern, one who fights to the end. I can appreciate that.”

  Hern sneered. “Sucking up to me ain’t going to help you any.”

  Maddox shook his head. “If we must fight to the death, you and me, you’ll die. Never doubt that.”

  “I doubt it very much, but I don’t doubt that you have a big mouth.”

  Maddox eyed the gorilla-sized man. “I don’t think you do doubt my fighting skills. You know I can kill you.”

  “Bah. You’re a stick compared to me. You ain’t nothing special and we both know it.”

  Maddox didn’t bother with another response. He stood, testing his balance. Then he walked to the bars, looking into the stone corridor. There were other cells filled with other tough looking men. Some watched him with open hostility.

  “Are they all part of Gallant Ophir’s stable?” Maddox asked.

  Hern nodded.

  “Do you know much about the Honey Men’s culture?”

  “Not that it will help you any,” Hern said, “but they’re weirdoes and freaks. Worse than that, they serve ancient monsters.”

  “Do you mean people?”

  “Monsters from what I’ve heard,” Hern said. “The monsters have the guise of people, though.”

  “Does anyone raise bees in the north?”

  Hern looked at Maddox. “You don’t know much, do you? Maybe your story was true.”

  “Quite true,” Maddox said. “Soldiers of Leviathan or a Leviathan substitute are on their way to Gath.”