Chapter 43
"There it is Tarzan." Announced Mors as pointed to a set of stone stairs with a flaming torch on each side.
The steps were few and led to an entrance into the volcano's interior.
"Though its hardly a secret entrance." Added Mors.
"It is now." Said Tarzan. "Zinj apes are its sentry. They're with us now."
The Zinj apes escorted the two League members along the path. Tarzan was their chieftain now, they would do his bidding.
Mors found it suspenseful walking with the primordial furies; he kept his distance and tried unsuccessfully to avoid eye contact. Whenever he met their wild gaze, it looked like they were a second away from pouncing on him. Only Greystoke's tenuous hold on their loyalty stopped them doing so. Seeing the entrance brought a little relief.
A look around to see if the general simian hostility had abated; revealed to Mors that it had been replaced by a new concern about something in the vicinity. It wasn't the newly discovered entrance that had all the apes and Tarzan spellbound, they were each frantically engaging their senses to find a freshly perceived danger.
A familiar roar told all. It reverberated throughout the area. Tarzan drew his knife and the Zinj apes braced for an engagement. The sabre-toothed tiger appeared on a rock platform to designate the entire party as prey. He bore his enlarged canines as weapons thirsting for blood, then leaped down from his rocky stage to charge.
Mors backed off keeping his rifle level; he noticed the big cat had a manacle around its right foreleg which had a long chain attached to it. This beast had become a second sentry for the stone entrance. The apes snarled then, upon word from Tarzan, rushed towards the oncoming titan. They surely felt no fear. The tiger pounced on the fastest of these and, in a split-second, clamped his jaws on the furry neck and crushed his spine. The other simians were on the feline monstrosity a second later: some leapt onto his back and pounded the flesh while emitting their battle grunts; others assaulted the side with their own teeth; one faced it head on and was soon impaled by both biting canines. The unfortunate ape opened his mouth to scream, but it was blood that gushed out, as his insides were mashed by the powerful chewing.
The tiger rolled to shake off the assailants on both his back and sides, this was done while his last victim remained impaled on his sabre teeth. It dislodged his simian foes for a mere second, before they resumed their assault. One was brought under the tiger's pressing foreleg, a heavy scratch with the other paw tore the pinned ape's front torso to ribbons.
The luftpirate could not use his rifle now for fear of hitting Tarzan or his simian allies. All the frenzied movements were unpredictable and chaotic; one such swing accidentally knocked the knife out of the jungle lords hand. Tarzan got a few feet clear of the savage fight and seized the chain attached to the manacle, he gave it a mighty yank and the tiger screamed. It had dislodged the ape corpse from its sabre teeth and clearly wanted the loin clothed man to be its next impalee. Whether the foreleg was fractured, dislocated or just sprained, it was certainly compromised; the cat's horizontal pounce was weak. Tarzan leaped high over the prehistoric fury's attack and landed on its back, quickly clamping his legs on its torso and arms around the neck.
Most Zinj apes were concentrating their attack on the feline rear, at a muttered command from their human chief they began to employ their great strength and lift both back legs off the ground. The tiger tried to turn his head but Tarzan's legendary grip on its neck kept the sabre-toothed head pointing forward. Only one ape continued to assault the cat's front; a swipe from its uninjured forepaw dug claws into the simian throat, tearing out its organs, the unfortunate anthropoid slumped while futilely grasping its fatal wound.
Tarzan could not break this tough tiger neck but he could keep the lethal teeth and claws away from the apes who were now dragging their antagonist backwards. The uninjured feline claws dug into the hard ground and made a long scratch mark as the beast was dragged along.
Mors now had his opening and aimed his rifle at the exposed torso. Tarzan yelled out a protest, thinking the gunshot sound would not only bring attention to their presence but cause the Zinj apes to abandon their current task and attack the luftpirate. When the rifle fired it made virtually no sound; Mors had it on a secret silent setting that his advanced weaponry had. That shot and two subsequent shots hit the tiger killing it. The Zinj apes were not angered by the silent firearm; they relaxed their hold on their now dead opponent.
Tarzan got up off the dead tiger's back and then heard Mors call out to him.
"Well well. There's Irma Vep at the entrance signaling us to come in."