CHAPTER VI
PRIESTESS OF THE SHINING ONE
"YOU'D better "have this handy, Doc." O'Keefe paused at the head of the stairway and handed me one of the automatics he had taken from Von Hetzdorp.
"Shall I not have one also?" rather anxiously asked the latter.
"When you need it you'll get it," answered O'Keefe. "I'll tell you frankly, though, professor, that you'll have to show me before I trust you with a gun. You shoot too straight—from cover."
The flash of anger in the German's eyes turned to a cold consideration.
"You say always just what is in your mind, Lieutenant O'Keefe," he mused. "Ja—that I shall remember." Later I was to recall this odd observation, and Von Hetzdorp was to remember, indeed.
In single file, O'Keefe at the head and Olaf bringing up the rear, we passed through the portal. Before us dropped a circular shaft, into which the light from the chamber of the oval streamed liquidly; set in its sides, the steps spiraled, and down them we went, cautiously. The stairway ended in a circular well; silent, with no trace of exit. The rounded stones joined each other evenly, hermetically. Carved on one of the slabs was one of the fire flowered vines. I pressed my fingers upon the calyxes, even as Larry had within the moon chamber.
A crack—horizontal, four feet wide- appeared on the wall; widened, and as the sinking slab that made it dropped to the level of our eyes, we looked through a hundred-feet-long rift in the living rock! The stone fell steadily, and we saw that it was a Cyclopean wedge set within the slit of the passageway. It reached the level of our feet and stopped. At the far end of this tunnel, whose floor was the polished rock that had, a moment before, fitted hermetically into its roof, was a low, narrow, triangular opening through which light streamed.
"Nowhere to go but out!" grinned Larry. "And I'll bet Golden Eyes is waiting for us with a taxi!" He stepped forward. We followed, slipping, sliding, along the glassy surface. And I, for one, had a lively apprehension of what our fate would be should that enormous mass rise before we had emerged. We reached the end, crept out of the narrow triangle that was its exit.
We stood upon a wide ledge carpeted with a thick yellow moss. I looked behind, and clutched O'Keefe's arm. The door through which we had come had vanished! There was only a precipice of pale rock, on whose surfaces great patches of the amber moss hung; around whose base our ledge ran, and whose summits, if summits it had, were hidden, like the luminous cliffs, in the radiance above us.
"Nowhere to go but ahead, and Golden Eyes hasn't kept her date!" laughed O'Keefe—but somewhat grimly.
We looked down. At the left the green roadway curved, and, at least thirty feet below us, swept on. Far off to the right it swerved again and continued as the glistening distant ribbon we had seen from the high oval. Within its loop, like a peninsula, its foot bathed by the lake, lay the gardened city. What was beyond the road we could not see for, all along its outer side, it was banked with solid masses of high-flung verdure.
We walked a few yards along the ledge and, rounding a corner, faced the end of one of the slender bridges. From this vantage point the oddly shaped vehicles were plain, and we could see they were, indeed, like the shell of the Nautilus and elfinly beautiful. Their drivers sat high upon the forward whorl. Their bodies were piled high with cushions, upon which lay women half-swathed in gay silken webs. From the pavilioned gardens smaller channels of glistening green ran into the broad way, much as usual automobile runways do; and in and out of them flashed the fairy shells.
There came a shout from one. Its occupants had glimpsed us. They pointed; others stopped and stared; one shell turned and sped up a runway—and quickly over the other side of the bridge came a score of men. They were dwarfed—none of them more than five feet high, prodigiously broad of shoulder, clearly enormously powerful.
"Trolde!" muttered Olaf, stepping beside O'Keefe, pistol swinging free in his hand.
But at the middle of the bridge the leader stopped, waved back his men, and came toward us alone, palms outstretched in the immemorial, universal gesture of truce. He paused, scanning us with manifest wonder; we returned the scrutiny with interest. The dwarf's face was as white as Olaf's—far whiter than those of the other three of us; the features clean-cut and noble, almost classical; the wide set eyes of a curious greenish gray and the black hair curling over his head like that on some old Greek statue.
Dwarfed though he was, there was no suggestion of deformity about him. The gigantic shoulders were covered with a loose green tunic that looked like fine linen. It was caught in at the waist by a broad girdle studded with what seemed to be amazonites. In it was thrust a long curved poniard resembling the Malaysian kris. His legs were swathed in the same green cloth as the upper garment. His feet were sandaled.
My gaze returned to his face, and in it I found something subtly disturbing; an expression of half-malicious gaiety that underlay the wholly prepossessing features like a vague threat. A mocking deviltry that hinted at entire callousness to suffering or sorrow; something of the spirit that was vaguely alien and disquieting.
HE SPOKE, and to my surprise, enough of the words were familiar to enable me clearly to catch the meaning of the whole. They were Polynesian, the Polynesian of the Samoans which is its most ancient form, but in some indefinable way—archaic. Later I was to know that the tongue bore the same relation to the Polynesian of today as does that of Chaucer to modern English.
Huldricksson spoke Polynesian well, and understood it better than he spoke it; O'Keefe had a working smattering. Later I was to find the German was a master of it.
"From whence do you come, strangers, and how found you your way here?" said the green dwarf.
I waved my hand toward the cliff behind us. His eyes narrowed incredulously; he glanced at its drop, upon which even a mountain goat could not have made its way, and laughed.
"We came through the rock," I answered his thought. "And we come in peace," I added.
"And may peace walk with you," he said half-derisively, "if the Shining One wills it!"
He considered us again.
"Show me, strangers, where you came through the rock," he commanded. We led the way to where we had emerged from the well of the stairway.
"It was here," I said, tapping the cliff.
"But I see no opening," he said suavely.
"It closed behind us," I answered; and then, for the first time, realized how incredible the explanation sounded. The derisive gleam passed through his eyes again. But he drew his poniard and gravely sounded the rock.
"You give a strange turn to our speech," he said. "It sounds strangely, indeed—as strange as your answers." He looked at us quizzically. "I wonder where you learned it! Well, all that you can explain to the Afyo Maie." His head bowed and his arms swept out in a wide salaam. "Be pleased to come with me!" he ended abruptly.
"In peace?" I asked.
"In peace," he replied. Then slowly, "With me, at least."
"Oh, come on, Doc!" cried Larry. "As long as we're here let's see the sights. Allons, mon vieux!" he called gaily to the green dwarf. The latter, understanding the spirit, if not the words, looked at O'Keefe with a twinkle of approval.
He stood aside and waved a hand courteously, inviting us to pass. We reached the bridge again; he spoke two words to his men, who immediately lined up on each side of the arch, watching us as we walked between them with same suggestion of expectant, malicious derision that I found so disquieting in their leader. We crossed. At the base of the span one of the elfin shells was waiting.
"Free ride in the subway patrol," whispered O'Keefe, grinning.
Beyond, scores of the shells had gathered, their occupants evidently discussing us in much excitment. The green dwarf waved us to the piles of cushions and then threw himself beside us. The vehicle started off smoothly, the now silent throng making way, and swept down the green roadway at a terrific pace and wholly without vibration, toward the seven-terraced tower.
We turned abruptly and swept up a runaway through one of the gardens, and stopped softly before a pillared pavilion. I saw now that these were much larger than I had thought. The structure to which we had been carried covered, I estimated, fully an acre. Oblong, with its slender, vari-colored columns spaced regularly, its walls were like the sliding screens of the Japanese. I had little time to note them, nor, to my regret, to satisfy my very eager curiosity as to the character of the trees and the beautiful bowering blossoms.
The green dwarf hurried us up a flight of broad steps flanked by great carved serpents, winged and scaled. He stamped twice upon mosaicked stones between two of the pillars, and a screen rolled aside, revealing an immense hall, scattered about with low divans on which lolled a dozen or more of the dwarfish men, dressed identically as he.
They sauntered up to us leisurely; the surprised interest in their faces tempered by the same inhumanly gay malice that seemed to be characteristic of all these people we had as yet seen.
"The Afyo Maie awaits them, Rador," said one.
So the green dwarf's name was Rador.
He nodded, beckoned us, and led the way through the great hall and into a smaller chamber whose far side was covered with the opacity I had noted from the aerie of the cliff. I examined the—blackness—with lively interest.
It had neither substance nor texture; it was not matter—and yet it suggested solidity; an entire cessation, a complete absorption of light; an ebon veil at once immaterial and palpable. I stretched, involuntarily, my hand out toward it, and felt it quickly drawn back.
"Do you seek your end so soon?" whispered Rador. "But I forgot that you do not know," he added; "On your life touch not the blackness, ever. It—"
He stopped, for abruptly in the density a portal appeared; springing out of the shadow like a picture thrown by a lantern upon a screen. Through it was revealed, a chamber filled with a soft, rosy glow. Rising, from cushioned couches, a woman and a man regarded us, half leaning over a long, low table of what seemed polished jet, laden with flowers and unfamiliar fruits.
About the room—that part of it, at least, that I could see—were a few oddly shaped chairs of the same substance. On high silvery tripods stood three immense globes, and it was from them that the rose glow emanated. At the side of the woman stood a smaller globe whose roseate gleam was tempered by quivering waves of blue.
"Enter Rador with the strangers!" a clear, sweet voice called.
Rador bowed deeply and stood aside, motioning us to pass. We entered, the green dwarf behind us, and out of the corner of my eye I saw the doorway fade as abruptly as it had appeared and again the dense shadow fill its place.
"Come closer, strangers. Be not afraid!" commanded the bell-toned voice.
We approached.
The woman, unimaginative scientist that I am, made the breath catch in my throat. Never had I seen a woman so beautiful as was Yolara of the Dweller city, and none of so perilous a beauty. Her hair was of the color of the young tassels of the corn and coiled in a regal crown above her broad, white brows. Her wide eyes were of gray that could change to a corn-flower blue and in anger deepen to purple. Gray or blue, they had little laughing devils within them, but when the storm of anger darkened them, they were no longer laughing.
The silken web that half covered, half revealed her did not hide the ivory whiteness of her flesh nor the sweet curve of shoulders and breasts. But for all her amazing beauty, she was sinister! There was cruelty about the curving mouth, and in the music of her voice. Not conscious cruelty, but the more terrifying, careless cruelty of nature itself. And she exhaled an essence of vitality that made the nerves tingle toward her and shrink from her, too, as from something abnormal.
The girl of the rose wall had been beautiful, yes! But here beauty was human, understandable. You could imagine her with a babe in her arms, but you could not so imagine this woman! About her loveliness hovered something unearthly. A sweet, feminine echo of the Dweller was Yolara, the Dweller's priestess—and as gloriously, terrifying evil!
AS I LOOKED at her the man arose and made his way round the table toward us. For the first time my eyes took in Lugur. A few inches taller than the green dawrf, he was far broader, more filled with the suggestion of strength.
The tremendous shoulders were four feet wide if an inch, tapering down to mighty thewed thighs. The muscles of his chest stood out beneath his tunic of red. Around his forehead shone a chaplet of bright-blue stones, sparkling among the thick curls of his silver-ash hair.
Upon his face pride and ambition were written large, and power still larger. All the mockery, the malice, the hint of callous indifference that I had noted in the other dwarfish men were there, too—but intensified, touched with the satanic.
The woman spoke again.
"Who are you strangers, and how come you here?" She turned to Rador. "Or is it that they do not understand or speak our tongue?"
"One understands and speaks it, but very badly, O Yolara," answered the green dwarf.
"Speak, then, that one of you," she commanded.
But it was Von Hetzdorp who found his voice first, and I marveled at the fluency, so much greater than mine, with which he spoke.
"We came for different purposes. I to seek knowledge of a kind, he"—pointing to me—"of another. This man"—he looked at Olaf—"to find a wife and child."
The gray-blue eyes had been regarding O'Keefe steadily and with plainly increasing interest.
"And why did you come?" she asked him. "Nay, I would have him speak for himself, if he can," she stilled Von Hetzdorp peremptorily.
When Larry spoke it was haltingly, in the tongue that was strange to him, searching for the proper words.
"I came to help these men, and because something. I could not then understand called me, O lady whose eyes are like forest pools at dawn," he answered. And even in the unfamiliar words there was a touch of the Irish brogue, and little merry lights danced in the eyes Larry had so apostrophized.
"I could find fault with your speech, but none with its burden," she said. "What forest pools are I know not, and the dawn has not shone upon the people of Lora these many sais of laya. But I sense what you mean!"
The eyes deepened to blue as she regarded him. I saw Lugur shift impatiently and send a none too pleasant look at O'Keefe. She smiled.
"Are there many like you in the world from which you come?" she asked softly. "Well, we soon shall—"
Lugur interrupted her almost rudely.
"Best we should know how they came hence," he growled
She darted a quick look at him, and again the little devils danced in her eyes.
"Yes, that is true," she said. "How came you here?"
Again it was Von Hetzdorp who answered—slowly, considering every word.
"In the world above," he said, "there are ruins of cities not built by any of those who now dwell there. To some of us above these places called, and we sought for knowledge of those wise ones passed on. We are seeking, and we found a passageway. The way led us downward to a door in yonder cliff, and through it we came here."
"Then you have found what you sought!" spoke she. "For we are of those who built the cities. But this gateway in the rock—where is it?"
"After we passed, it closed upon us; nor could we after find trace of it," answered Von Hetzdorp.
The incredulity that had shown upon the face of the green dwarf fell upon theirs; on Lugur's it was clouded with furious anger.
He turned to Rador.
"I could find no opening, lord," thus the green dwarf quickly.
And there was so fierce a fire in the eyes of Lugur as he swung back upon us that O'Keefe's hand slipped stealthily down toward his pistol.
"Best it is to speak truth to Yolara, priestess of the Shining One, and to Lugur, the Voice," he cried menacingly.
"It is the truth," I interposed. "We came down the passage. At its end was a carved vine, a vine of five flowers"—the fire died from the red dwarf's eyes, and I could have sworn to a swift pallor. "I rested a hand upon these flowers, and a door opened. But when we had gone through it and turned, behind us was nothing but unbroken cluff. The door had completely vanished."
I had taken my cue from Von Hetzdorp. If he had eliminated the episode of car and Moon Pool, he had good reason, I had no doubt; and I would be as cautious. And deep, within me something cautioned me to say nothing of my quest; to stifle all thought of Throckmartin. Something that warned, peremptorily, finally, as though it were a message from Throckmartin himself!
"A vine with five flowers!" exclaimed the red dwarf. "Was it like this, say?"
He thrust forward a long arm. Upon the thumb of the hand was an immense ring, set with a dull-blue stone. Graven on the face of the jewel was the symbol of the rosy walls of the Moon Chamber that had opened to us their two portals. But cut over the vine were seven circles, one about each of the flowers and two larger ones covering, intersecting them.
"This is the same," I said; "but these were not there"—I indicated the circles.
The woman drew a deep breath and looked deep into Lugur's eyes.
"The sign of the Silent Ones!" he half whispered.
It was the woman who first recovered herself.
"The strangers are weary, Lugur," she said. "When they are rested they shall show us where the rocks opened."
I sensed a subtle change in their attitude toward us; a new intentness; a doubt plainly tinged with apprehension. What was it they feared? I wondered; and why had the symbol of the vine wrought the change? And who or what were the Silent Ones?
YOLARA'S eyes turned to Olaf, hardened, and grew cold gray. Subconsciously I had noticed that from the first the Norseman had been absorbed in his regard of the pair; had indeed never taken his gaze from them; had noticed, too, the priestess dart swift glances toward him.
Upon Olaf's face had been an early look of puzzlement, of uncertainty. Now this had changed to decision; clearly he had made his mind up about something. His gaze was fixed; he returned the woman's scrutiny fearlessly; a touch of contempt in the clear eyes—like a child watching a snake which he did not dread, but whose danger he well knew.
Under that look Yolara stirred impatiently, sensing, I know, its meaning.
"Why do you look at me so?" she cried.
An expression of bewilderment passed over Olaf's face.
"I do not understand," he said in English.
I caught a quickly repressed gleam in O'Keefe's eyes. He knew, as I knew, that Olaf must have understood. But did Von Hetzdorp?
I glanced at him. Apparently he did not. But why was Olaf feigning this ignorance?
"This man is a sailor from what we call the North," thus Larry haltingly. "He is crazed, I think. He tells a strange tale, of a something of white fire that took his wife and babe. We found him wandering where we were. And because he is strong we brought him with us. That is all, O lady whose voice is sweeter than the honey of the wild bees!"
"A shape of white fire?" she repeated eagerly.
"A shape of white fire that whirled beneath the moon, with the sound of little bells," answered Larry, watching her intently.
She looked at Lugur and laughed.
"Then he, too, is fortunate," she said. "For he has come to the place of his something of white fire. And tell him that, he shall join his wife and child, in time; that I promise him."
Upon the Norseman's face there was no hint of comprehension, and at that moment I formed an entirely new opinion of Olaf's intelligence. For certainly it must have been a prodigious effort of the will indeed that enabled him, understanding, to control himself.
"What does she say?" he asked.
Larry repeated
An expression of gladness spread over his face.
"Good!" said Olaf. "Good!"
He looked at Yolara with well-assumed gratitude. Lugur, who had been scanning his bulk, drew close. He felt the giant muscles which Huldricksson accommodatingly flexed for him.
"But he shall meet Valdor and Tahola before he sees those kin of his," he laughed mockingly. "And if he bests them, he shall meet me. After that—for reward—his wife and babe!"
A shudder, quickly repressed, shook the seaman's frame. The woman bent her supremely beautiful head.
"These two," she said, pointing to the German and me, "seem to be men of learning. They may be useful. As for this man" —she smiled at Larry—"I would have him explain to me some things. She hesitated. "What 'hon-ey of 'e wild bees-s' is?" She laughed sweetly, sinisterly. "And now—take them, Rador, give them food and water and let them rest till we shall call them again."
She stretched out a hand toward O'Keefe. The Irishman bowed low over It, raised it softly to his lips. There was a vicious hiss from Lugur; but Yolara regarded Larry with eyes now all tender blue.
"You please me," she whispered.
And the face of Lugur grew dark with passion.
We turned to go. The rosy, azure-shot globe at her side suddenly dulled. From it came a faint bell sound as of chimes far away. She bent over it. It vibrated, and then its surface ran with little waves of dull color. From it came a whispering so low that I could not distinguish the words, if words they were.
She spoke to the red dwarf.
"They have brought the three who blasphemed the Shining One," she said slowly. "Now it is in my mind to show these strangers the justice of Lora. Perhaps, they may learn wisdom from it. What say you, Lugur?"
The red dwarf nodded, his eyes sparkling now with a malicious anticipation.
The woman spoke again to the globe. "Bring them here!"
And again it ran swiftly with its film of colors, darkened, and shone rosy once more. From without there came the rustle of many feet upon the rugs. Yolara pressed a slender hand upon the base of the pedestal of the globe beside her. Abruptly the light faded from all, and on the same instant the four walls of blackness vanished, revealing on two sides the lovely, unfamiliar garden through the guarding rows of pillars. At our backs soft draperies hid what lay beyond; before us, flanked by flowered screens, was the corridor through which we had entered, crowded now by the green dwarfs of the great hall.
THE dwarfs advanced. Each, I now noted, had the same clustering black hair of Rador. They separated, and from them stepped three figures—a youth of not more than twenty, short, but with great shoulders of all the males we had seen of this race; a girl of seventeen, I judged, white-faced, a head taller than the boy, her long, black hair disheveled, and clad in a simple white sleeveless garment that fell only to the knees. And behind these two a stunted, gnarled shape whose head was sunk deep between the enormous shoulders, whose white beard fell like that of some ancient gnome down to his waist, and whose eyes were a white flame of hate. The girl cast herself weeping at the feet of the priestess.
"You are Songar of the Lower Waters?" murmured Yolara almost caressingly. "And this is your daughter and her lover?"
The gnome nodded, the flame in his eyes leaping higher.
"It has come to me that you three have dared blaspheme the Shining One, its priestess, and its Voice," went on Yolara smoothly. "Also that you have called out to the three Silent Ones. Is it true?"
"Your spies have spoken, and have you not already judged us?" The voice of the old dwarf was bitter.
A flicker shot through the eyes of Yolara, again cold gray. The girl reached a trembling hand up to the hem of her veils. She thrust it aside with her foot, cruelly.
"Tell us why you did these things, Songar," she asked. "Why you did them, knowing well what your reward would be?" The dwarf stiffened; he raised his withered arms, and his eyes blazed.
"Because evil are your thoughts and evil are your deeds," he cried. "Yours and your lover's, there." He leveled a finger at Lugur. "Because of the Shining One you have made evil, too, and the greater wickedness you contemplate—you and he with the Shining One. But I tell you that your measure of iniquity is full; the tale of your sin near ended! Yea, the Silent Ones have been patient, but soon they will speak." He pointed at us. "A sign are they—a warning!"
In Yolara's eyes, grown black, the devils leaped unrestrained.
"Is it even so, Songar?" her voice caressed. "Now ask the Silent Ones to help you. They sit afar, but surely they will hear you." The sweet voice was mocking. "As for these two, they shall pray to the Shining One for forgiveness, and surely the Shining One will take them to its bosom! As for you, you have lived long enough, Songar! Pray to the Silent Ones, Songar, and pass out into the nothingness—you!"
She dipped down into her bosom and drew forth something that resembled a small cone of tarnished silver. She leveled it, a covering clicked from its base, and out of it darted a slender ray of intense green light.
It struck the old dwarf squarely over the heart, and swift as light itself spread, covering him with a gleaming, pale film. She clenched her hand upon the cone, and the ray disappeared; thrust it back into her breast and leaned forward expectantly; so Lugur and so the other dwarfs. From the girl came a low wail of anguish; the boy dropped upon his knees, covering his face.
For the moment the white beard stood rigid; then the robe that had covered him seemed to melt away, revealing all the knotted, monstrous body. And in that body a vibration began, increasing to incredible rapidity. It wavered before us like a reflection in a still pond stirred by a sudden wind. It grew and grew, to a rhythm whose rapidity was intolerable to watch and that still chained the eyes.
The figure grew indistinct, misty. Tiny sparks in infinite numbers leaped from it—like, I thought, the radiant shower of particles hurled out by radium when seen under the microscope. Mistier still it grew. And then there trembled before us for a moment a faintly luminous shadow which held, here and there, tiny sparkling atoms like those that pulsed in the light about us. The glowing shadow vanished, the sparkling atoms were still for a moment—and then they shot away, joining those dancing others.
Where the gnomelike form had been but a few short seconds before—there was nothing!
O'Keefe drew a long breath, and I was sensible of a prickling along my scalp.
Yolara leaned toward us.
"You have seen," she said Her eyes lingered tigerishly upon Olaf's pallid face. "Heed!" she whispered. She turned to the men in green, who were laughing softly among themselves.
"Take these two, and go!" she commanded.
"The justice of Lora," said the red dwarf. "The justice of Lora and the Shining One under Thanaroa!"
Upon the utterance of the last word I saw Von Hetzdorp start violently. The hand at his side made a swift, surreptitious gesture, so fleeting that I hardly caught it. The red dwarf stared at the German, and for the first time I saw complete amazement upon his face.
He glanced at Yolara, found her intent in thought, and as swiftly as had been Von Hetzdorp's action, returned it. I thought I saw the latter make an answering sign.
"Yolara," the red dwarf spoke, "it would please me to take this man of wisdom to my own place for a time. The giant I would have, too."
The woman awoke from her brooding; nodded.
"As you will, Lugur," she said. She beckoned Rador.
As he led us out I saw from the corner of my eye Olaf following quietly the German and the red dwarf. And again I wondered.
And as, shaken to the core, we passed out into the garden into the full throbbing of the light, I wondered if all the tiny sparkling diamond points that shook about us had once been men like Songar of the Lower Waters—and felt my very soul grow sick!