At last we turned to go--and around the corner of the path I caught another glimpse of what I have called the lake of jewels. I pointed to it.
"Those are lovely flowers, Lakla," I said. "I have never seen anything like them in the place from whence we come."
She followed my pointing finger--laughed.
"Come," she said, "let me show you them."
She ran down an intersecting way, we following; came out of it upon a little ledge close to the brink, three feet or more I suppose about it. The Golden Girl"s voice rang out in a high-pitched, tremulous, throbbing call.
The lake of jewels stirred as though a breeze had pa.s.sed over it; stirred, shook, and then began to move swiftly, a shimmering torrent of shining flowers down upon us! She called again, the movement became more rapid; the gem blooms streamed closer--closer, wavering, shifting, winding--at our very feet. Above them hovered a little radiant mist. The Golden Girl leaned over; called softly, and up from the sparkling ma.s.s shot a green vine whose heads were five flowers of flaming ruby--shot up, flew into her hand and coiled about the white arm, its quintette of lambent blossoms--regarding us!
It was the thing Lakla had called the _Yekta_; that with which she had threatened the priestess; the thing that carried the dreadful death--and the Golden Girl was handling it like a rose!
Larry swore--I looked at the thing more closely. It was a hydroid, a development of that strange animal-vegetable that, sometimes almost microscopic, waves in the sea depths like a cl.u.s.ter of flowers paralyzing its prey with the mysterious force that dwells in its blossom heads![2]
"Put it down, Lakla," the distress in O"Keefe"s voice was deep. Lakla laughed mischievously, caught the real fear for her in his eyes; opened her hand, gave another faint call--and back it flew to its fellows.
"Why, it wouldn"t hurt me, Larry!" she expostulated. "They know me!"
"Put it down!" he repeated hoa.r.s.ely.
She sighed, gave another sweet, prolonged call. The lake of gems--rubies and amethysts, mauves and scarlet-tinged blues--wavered and shook even as it had before--and swept swiftly back to that place whence she had drawn them!
Then, with Larry and Lakla walking ahead, white arm about his brown neck; the O"Keefe still expostulating, the handmaiden laughing merrily, we pa.s.sed through her bower to the domed castle.
Glancing through a cleft I caught sight again of the far end of the bridge; noted among the cl.u.s.tered figures of its garrison of the frog-men a movement, a flashing of green fire like marshlights on spear tips; wondered idly what it was, and then, other thoughts crowding in, followed along, head bent, behind the pair who had found in what was Olaf"s h.e.l.l, their true paradise.
[1] The _Akka_ are viviparous. The female produces progeny at five-year intervals, never more than two at a time. They are monogamous, like certain of our own _Ranidae_. Pending my monograph upon what little I had time to learn of their interesting habits and customs, the curious will find instruction and entertainment in Brandes and Schvenichen"s _Brutpfleige der Schwanzlosen Bat rachier_, p. 395; and Lilian V. Sampson"s _Unusual Modes of Breeding among Anura_, Amer. Nat. x.x.xiv., 1900.--W. T. G.
[2] The _Yekta_ of the Crimson Sea, are as extraordinary developments of hydroid forms as the giant _Medusae_, of which, of course, they are not too remote cousins. The closest resemblances to them in outer water forms are among the _Gymn.o.blastic Hydroids_, notably _Clavetella prolifera_, a most interesting ambulatory form of six tentacles.
Almost every bather in Southern waters, Northern too, knows the pain that contact with certain "jelly fish" produces. The _Yekta"s_ development was prodigious and, to us, monstrous. It secretes in its five heads an almost incredibly swiftly acting poison which I suspect, for I had no chance to verify the theory, destroys the entire nervous system to the accompaniment of truly infernal agony; carrying at the same time the illusion that the torment stretches through infinities of time. Both ether and nitrous oxide gas produce in the majority this sensation of time extension, without of course the pain symptom. What Lakla called the _Yekta_ kiss is I imagine about as close to the orthodox idea of h.e.l.l as can be conceived. The secret of her control over them I had no opportunity of learning in the rush of events that followed. Knowledge of the appalling effects of their touch came, she told me, from those few "who had been kissed so lightly" that they recovered. Certainly nothing, not even the Shining One, was dreaded by the Murians as these were--W. T. G.
CHAPTER XXVII
The Coming of Yolara
"Never was there such a girl!" Thus Larry, dreamily, leaning head in hand on one of the wide divans of the chamber where Lakla had left us, pleading service to the Silent Ones.
"An", by the faith and the honour of the O"Keefes, an" by my dead mother"s soul may G.o.d do with me as I do by her!" he whispered fervently.
He relapsed into open-eyed dreaming.
I walked about the room, examining it--the first opportunity I had gained to inspect carefully any of the rooms in the abode of the Three. It was octagonal, carpeted with the thick rugs that seemed almost as though woven of soft mineral wool, faintly shimmering, palest blue. I paced its diagonal; it was fifty yards; the ceiling was arched, and either of pale rose metal or metallic covering; it collected the light from the high, slitted windows, and shed it, diffused, through the room.
Around the octagon ran a low gallery not two feet from the floor, bal.u.s.traded with slender pillars, close set; broken at opposite curtained entrances over which hung thick, dull-gold curtainings giving the same suggestion of metallic or mineral substance as the rugs. Set within each of the eight sides, above the balcony, were colossal slabs of lapis lazuli, inset with graceful but unplaceable designs in scarlet and sapphire blue.
There was the great divan on which mused Larry; two smaller ones, half a dozen low seats and chairs carved apparently of ivory and of dull soft gold.
Most curious were tripods, strong, pikelike legs of golden metal four feet high, holding small circles of the lapis with intaglios of one curious symbol somewhat resembling the ideographs of the Chinese.
There was no dust--nowhere in these caverned s.p.a.ces had I found this constant companion of ours in the world overhead. My eyes caught a sparkle from a corner. Pursuing it I found upon one of the low seats a flat, clear crystal oval, remarkably like a lens. I took it and stepped up on the balcony. Standing on tiptoe I found I commanded from the bottom of a window slit a view of the bridge approach. Scanning it I could see no trace of the garrison there, nor of the green spear flashes. I placed the crystal to my eyes--and with a disconcerting abruptness the cavern mouth leaped before me, apparently not a hundred feet away; decidedly the crystal was a very excellent lens--but where were the guards?
I peered closely. Nothing! But now against the aperture I saw a score or more of tiny, dancing sparks. An optical illusion, I thought, and turned the crystal in another direction. There were no sparklings there. I turned it back again--and there they were. And what were they like? Realization came to me--they were like the little, dancing, radiant atoms that had played for a time about the emptiness where had stood Sorgar of the Lower Waters before he had been shaken into the nothingness! And that green light I had noticed--the _Keth_!
A cry on my lips, I turned to Larry--and the cry died as the heavy curtainings at the entrance on my right undulated, parted as though a body had slipped through, shook and parted again and again--with the dreadful pa.s.sing of unseen things!
"Larry!" I cried. "Here! Quick!"
He leaped to his feet, gazed about wildly--and disappeared!
Yes--vanished from my sight like the snuffed flame of a candle or as though something moving with the speed of light itself had s.n.a.t.c.hed him away!
Then from the divan came the sounds of struggle, the hissing of straining breaths, the noise of Larry cursing. I leaped over the bal.u.s.trade, drawing my own pistol--was caught in a pair of mighty arms, my elbows crushed to my sides, drawn down until my face pressed close to a broad, hairy breast--and through that obstacle--formless, shadowless, transparent as air itself--I could still see the battle on the divan!
Now there were two sharp reports; the struggle abruptly ceased. From a point not a foot over the great couch, as though oozing from the air itself, blood began to drop, faster and ever faster, pouring out of nothingness.
And out of that same air, now a dozen feet away, leaped the face of Larry--bodyless, poised six feet above the floor, blazing with rage--floating weirdly, uncannily to a hideous degree, in vacancy.
His hands flashed out--armless; they wavered, appearing, disappearing--swiftly tearing something from him. Then there, feet hidden, stiff on legs that vanished at the ankles, striking out into vision with all the dizzy abruptness with which he had been stricken from sight was the O"Keefe, a smoking pistol in hand.
And ever that red stream trickled out of vacancy and spread over the couch, dripping to the floor.
I made a mighty movement to escape; was held more firmly--and then close to the face of Larry, flashing out with that terrifying instantaneousness even as had his, was the head of Yolara, as devilishly mocking as I had ever seen it, the cruelty shining through it like delicate white flames from h.e.l.l--and beautiful!
"Stir not! Strike not--until I command!" She flung the words beyond her, addressed to the invisible ones who had accompanied her; whose presences I sensed filling the chamber. The floating, beautiful head, crowned high with corn-silk hair, darted toward the Irishman. He took a swift step backward. The eyes of the priestess deepened toward purple; sparkled with malice.
"So," she said. "So, _Larree_--you thought you could go from me so easily!" She laughed softly. "In my hidden hand I hold the _Keth_ cone," she murmured. "Before you can raise the death tube I can smite you--and will. And consider, _Larree_, if the handmaiden, the _choya_ comes, I can vanish--so"--the mocking head disappeared, burst forth again--"and slay her with the _Keth_--or bid my people seize her and bear her to the Shining One!"
Tiny beads of sweat stood out on O"Keefe"s forehead, and I knew he was thinking not of himself, but of Lakla.
"What do you want with me, Yolara?" he asked hoa.r.s.ely.
"Nay," came the mocking voice. "Not Yolara to you, _Larree_--call me by those sweet names you taught me--Honey of the Wild Bee-e-s, Net of Hearts--" Again her laughter tinkled.
"What do you want with me?" his voice was strained, the lips rigid.
"Ah, you are afraid, _Larree_." There was diabolic jubilation in the words. "What should I want but that you return with me? Why else did I creep through the lair of the dragon worm and pa.s.s the path of perils but to ask you that? And the _choya_ guards you not well." Again she laughed. "We came to the cavern"s end and, there were her _Akka_. And the _Akka_ can see us--as shadows. But it was my desire to surprise you with my coming, Larree," the voice was silken. "And I feared that they would hasten to be first to bring you that message to delight in your joy. And so, _Larree_, I loosed the _Keth_ upon them--and gave them peace and rest within the nothingness. And the portal below was open--almost in welcome!"
Once more the malignant, silver pealing of her laughter.
"What do you want with me?" There was wrath in his eyes, and plainly he strove for control.
"Want!" the silver voice hissed, grew calm. "Do not Siya and Siyana grieve that the rite I pledged them is but half done--and do they not desire it finished? And am I not beautiful? More beautiful than your _choya_?"
The fiendishness died from the eyes; they grew blue, wondrous; the veil of invisibility slipped down from the neck, the shoulders, half revealing the gleaming b.r.e.a.s.t.s. And weird, weird beyond all telling was that exquisite head and bust floating there in air--and beautiful, sinisterly beautiful beyond all telling, too. So even might Lilith, the serpent woman, have shown herself tempting Adam!