Abraham Merritt

“ But before it was wholly poised, before the priestess could loose its force, the handmaiden was upon her. Swift as the lithe white wolf hound she leaped, and one slender hand gripped Yolara's throat, the other the wrist that lifted the quivering death; white limbs wrapped about the hidden ones. I saw the golden head bend, the hand that held the Keth swept up with a vicious jerk; saw Lakla's teeth sink into the wrist—the blood spurt forth and heard the priestess shriek. ”

“ Why did you do these things?"
"I came for him!" gasped the priestess; she pointed to O'Keefe.
"Why?" asked Lakla.
"Because he is pledged to me," replied Yolara, all the devils that were hers in her face. "Because he wooed me! Because he is mine!"
"That is a lie!" The handmaiden's voice shook with rage. "It is a lie! But here and now he shall choose, Yolara. And if you he chooses, you and he shall go forth from here unmolested. For, Yolara, it is his happiness that I most desire, and if you are that happiness—you shall go together. And now, Larry, choose!" ”

“ Swam out of the coruscating haze the Dweller's—face!
Both of man and woman it was, like some ancient, androgynous deity of Etruscan fanes long dust, and yet neither woman nor man. Human and inhuman; seraphic and sinister; benign and malefic—and still no more of these four than is flame, which is beautiful whether it warms or devours, or wind whether it feathers the trees or shatters them, or the wave which is wondrous whether it caresses or kills. ”

“ Mockery and disbelief rode high in the priestess's pose. "Am I to return alone, like this?" she asked.
"Nay, Yolara, nay; you shall be accompanied," said Lakla. "And by those who will guard, and watch you well. They are here even now."
The hangings parted, and into the chamber came Olaf and Rador—and paused in blank amazement.
"You traitor!" hissed the priestess to the green dwarf. "Be sure that you shall not dance with the Shining One!"
He gazed at her, face stern, immovable; listened to Lakla's swift explanation. ”

“ The curtains toward which O'Keefe had slowly, step by step, drawn close, opened.
They framed the handmaiden! The face of Yolara changed into that gorgon mask that had transformed it once before at sight of the Golden Girl. In her blind rage she forgot to cast the occulting veil. Her hand darted like a snake out of the folds; poising itself with the little silver cone aimed at Lakla. ”

“ And upon this the Medusae gorged; pulsing lambently; their wondrous colors shifting, changing, glowing stronger. Elfin moons now indeed, but satellites whose glimmering beauty was fed by death; alembics of enchantment whose glorious hues were sucked from horror.
Sick, I turned away. O'Keefe was as pale as I. We passed back into the corridor that had opened on the ledge from which we had watched; met Lakla hurrying toward us. ”

“ Three of the rings of vapor spun into intense light; raced around each other. From the screen behind us grew a radiance that held within itself all spectrums—not only those seen, but those unseen by man's eyes. It waxed and waxed, brilliant and ever more brilliant, all suffusing, passing through me as day streams through a window pane!
The enclosing facets burst into a blaze of coruscations, and in each sparkling panel I saw our image, shaken and torn like pennants in a whirlwind. I turned to look, was stopped by the handmaiden's swift command: "Turn not, on your life!" ”

“ The O'Keefe's voice was subdued, hurt. "There is no choice. I love you, Lakla, and only you, and have from the moment I saw you. It's not easy, this. God, Goodwin, I feel like an utter cad," he flashed at me. "There is no choice, Lakla," he ended, eyes steady upon hers.
The priestess's face grew deadlier still.
"What will you do with me?" she asked.
"Keep you," I said, "as hostage."
O'Keefe was silent; the Golden Girl shook her head.
"Well would I like to." Her face grew dreaming. "But the Silent Ones say no. They bid me let you go, Yolara."
"The Silent Ones," the priestess laughed. ”

“ He said it quietly.
"Then shall I spare the handmaiden, and—who knows?—take back my armies that even now gather at the portal and let the Silent Ones rot in peace in their abode, from which they had no power to keep me," she added venomously.
"You will swear that, Yolara; swear to go without harming the handmaiden?" he asked eagerly. The little devils danced in her eyes. I wrenched my face from the smothering contact.
"Don't trust her, Larry!" I cried. And again the grip choked me.
"Is that devil in front of you or behind you, old man?" he asked quietly, eyes never leaving the priestess. ”

“ Then passing like a presence, it died away in far distance.
"The Portal has opened," said the handmaiden. And a fainter sighing, like an echo of the other, mourned about us. "Yolara is gone," she said, "the Portal is closed. Now must we hasten. For the Three have ordered that you, Goodwin, and Larry and I go upon that strange road of which I have spoken, and which Olaf may not take lest his heart break. And we must return ere he and Rador cross the bridge."
Her hand sought Larry's; we passed down to a chamber in which stood a table, bearing one of the crystal ewers and goblets. ”

“ An extremely direct maiden was Lakla, with a truly sovereign contempt for anything she might consider non-essential. At this moment I decided she was wiser even than I had thought her.
She called, and to her came the frog woman who was her attendant. To her the handmaiden spoke, pointing to the batracians who stood, paws and forearms melted beneath the robes of invisibility they had gathered. ”

“ 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 pass the path of perils but to ask you that? ”

“ We were incorporated with, a part of, the rock—and yet we were living flesh and blood. We stretched—nor will I qualify this—we stretched through mile upon mile of space that weirdly enough gave at one and the same time an absolute certainty of immense horizontal lengths and a vertical concentration that contained nothing of length, nothing of space whatever. We stood there upon the face of the stone, and still we were here within the faceted oval before the screen of radiance!
"Steady!" It was Lakla's voice, and not beside me there, but at my ear close before the screen. "Steady, Goodwin! ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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 honor of the O'Keefes, an' by my dead mother's soul may God do with me as I do by her!" he whispered fervently.
I told him what Rador had revealed to me regarding the handmaiden and her origin. He nodded, showing no surprise whatever.
"Sure," he said. "It's as I told you. The Silent Ones are of the Tuatha De, an' they send to Ireland for the colleens. They won't have anything to do with the crowd here. ”

“ Try as I would I could not see them—nor Stanton and the northern woman named Thora who had been the| first of that tragic party to be taken by the Dweller.
"Throckmartin!" I cried again, despairingly. My tears blinded me.
I felt Lakla's light touch.
"Steady," she I commanded, pityingly. "Steady, Goodwin! You cannot help them now! Steady and—watch!" ”