One, they carried it; fifty of them to each side of the ram; and behind them stepped — Marakinoff!
Larry awoke to life.
“Now, thank God,” he rasped, “I can get that devil, anyway!”
He drew his pistol, took careful aim. Even as he pressed the trigger there rang through the abode a tremendous clanging. The ram was battering at the gates. O’Keefe’s bullet went wild. The Russian must have heard the shot; perhaps the missile was closer than we knew. He made a swift leap behind the guards; was lost to sight.
Once more the thunderous clanging rang through the castle.
Lakla drew herself erect; down upon her dropped the listening aloofness. Gravely she bowed her head.
“It is time, O love of mine.” She turned to O’Keefe. “The Silent Ones say that the way of fear is closed, but the way of love is open. They call upon us to redeem our promise!”
For a hundred heart-beats they clung to each other, breast to breast and lip to lip. Below, the clangour was increasing, the great trunk swinging harder and faster upon the metal gates. Now Lakla gently loosed the arms of the O’Keefe, and for another instant those two looked into each other’s souls. The handmaiden smiled tremulously.
“I would it might have been otherwise, Larry darlin’,” she whispered. “But at least — we pass together, dearest of mine!”
She leaped to the window.
“Yolara!” the golden voice rang out sweetly. The clanging ceased. “Draw back your men. We open the Portal and come forth to you and the Shining One — Larry and I.”
The priestess’s silver chimes of laughter rang out, cruel, mocking.
“Come, then, quickly,” she jeered. “For surely both the Shining One and I yearn for you!” Her malice-laden laughter chimed high once more. “Keep us not lonely long!” the priestess mocked.
Larry drew a deep breath, stretched both hands out to me.
“It’s good-by, I guess, Doc.” His voice was strained. “Good-by and good luck, old boy. If you get out, and you WILL, let the old Dolphin know I’m gone. And carry on, pal — and always remember the O’Keefe loved you like a brother.”
I squeezed his hands desperately. Then out of my balanceshaking woe a strange comfort was born.
“Maybe it’s not good-by, Larry!” I cried. “The banshee has not cried!”
A flash of hope passed over his face; the old reckless grin shone forth.
“It’s so!” he said. “By the Lord, it’s so!”
Then Lakla bent toward me, and for the second time — kissed me.
“Come!” she said to Larry. Hand in hand they moved away, into the corridor that led to the door outside of which waited the Shining One and its priestess.
And unseen by them, wrapped as they were within their love and sacrifice, I crept softly behind. For I had determined that if enter the Dweller’s embrace they must, they should not go alone.
They paused before the Golden Portals; the handmaiden pressed its opening lever; the massive leaves rolled back.
Heads high, proudly, serenely, they passed through and out upon the hither span. I followed.
On each side of us stood the Dweller’s slaves, faces turned rigidly toward their master. A hundred feet away the Shining One pulsed and spiralled in its evilly glorious lambency of sparkling plumes.
Unhesitating, always with that same high serenity, Lakla and the O’Keefe, hands clasped like little children, drew closer to that wondrous shape. I could not see their faces, but I saw awe fall upon those of the watching dwarfs, and into the burning eyes of Yolara crept a doubt. Closer they drew to the Dweller, and closer, I following them step by step. The Shining One’s whirling lessened; its tinklings were faint, almost stilled. It seemed to watch them apprehensively. A silence fell upon us all, a thick silence, brooding, ominous, palpable. Now the pair were face to face with the child of the Three — so near that with one of its misty tentacles it could have enfolded them.
And the Shining One drew back!
Yes, drew back — and back with it stepped Yolara, the doubt in her eyes deepening. Onward paced the handmaiden and the O’Keefe — and step by step, as they advanced, the Dweller withdrew; its bell notes chiming out, puzzled questioning — half fearful!
And back it drew, and back until it had reached the very centre of that platform over the abyss in whose depths pulsed the green fires of earth heart. And there Yolara gripped herself; the hell that seethed within her soul leaped out of her eyes, a cry, a shriek of rage, tore from her lips.
As at a signal, the Shining One flamed high; its spirals and eddying mists swirled madly, the pulsing core of it blazed radiance. A score of coruscating tentacles swept straight upon the pair who stood intrepid, unresisting, awaiting its embrace. And upon me, lurking behind them.
Through me swept a mighty exaltation. It was the end then — and I was to meet it with them.
Something drew us back, back with an incredible swiftness, and yet as gently as a summer breeze sweeps a bit of thistle-down! Drew us back from those darting misty arms even as they were a hair-breadth from us! I heard the Dweller’s bell notes burst out ragingly! I heard Yolara scream.
What was that?
Between the three of us and them was a ring of curdled moon flames, swirling about the Shining One and its priestess, pressing in upon them, enfolding them!
And within it I glimpsed the faces of the Three — implacable, sorrowful, filled with a supernal power!
Sparks and flashes of white flame darted from the ring, penetrating the radiant swathings of the Dweller, striking through its pulsing nucleus, piercing its seven crowning orbs.
Now the Shining One’s radiance began to dim, the seven orbs to dull; the tiny sparkling filaments that ran from them down into the Dweller’s body snapped, vanished! Through the battling nebulosities Yolara’s face swam forth — horror-filled, distorted, inhuman!
The ranks of the dead-alive quivered, moved, writhed, as though each felt the torment of the Thing that had enslaved them. The radiance that the Three wielded grew more intense, thicker, seemed to expand. Within it, suddenly, were scores of flaming triangles — scores of eyes like those of the Silent Ones!
And the Shining One’s seven little moons of amber, of silver, of blue and amethyst and green, of rose and white, split, shattered, were gone! Abruptly the tortured crystal chimings ceased.
Dulled, all its soul-shaking beauty dead, blotched and shadowed squalidly, its gleaming plumes tarnished, its dancing spirals stripped from it, that which had been the Shining One wrapped itself about Yolara — wrapped and drew her into itself; writhed, swayed, and hurled itself over the edge of the bridge — down, down into the green fires of the unfathomable abyss — with its priestess still enfolded in its coils!
From the dwarfs who had watched that terror came screams of panic fear. They turned and ran, racing frantically over the bridge toward the cavern mouth.
The serried ranks of the dead-alive trembled, shook. Then from their faces tied the horror of wedded ecstasy and anguish. Peace, utter peace, followed in its wake.
And as fields of wheat are bent and fall beneath the wind, they fell. No longer dead-alive, now all of the blessed dead, freed from their dreadful slavery!
Abruptly from the sparkling mists the cloud of eyes was gone. Faintly revealed in them were only the heads of the Silent Ones. And they drew before us; were before us! No flames now in their ebon eyes — for the flickering fires were quenched in great tears, streaming down the marble white faces. They bent toward us, over us; their radiance enfolded us. My eyes darkened. I could not see. I felt a tender hand upon my head — and panic and frozen dread and nightmare web that held me fled.
Then