Astounding Stories, July, 1931 Part 9

"You first!" Craig snapped, and as Taia started across a spear came hurtling from the mob behind, and clanked against the rocky wall on the far side. Nimbly Taia sped over the bridge, and Wes, the yells of Hrihor and his men loud in his ears, followed.

Midway a long spear snaked after him. It missed by inches, and went pitching into the gulf. In his haste he caught his foot on the interlaced thongs, stumbled and almost fell--which saved his life, for another spear streaked through the very spot he had been a second before. Then he was across, and his sword was flashing in vicious hacks at one of the two main supporting thongs of the bridge.

The hide was tough, but Craig's strength was that of a desperate man, and in several mighty strokes he severed it. The framework slumped to one side, held only by one thong. Hrihor, half across, croaked in sudden horror and sprang back as he saw the stranger raise his blade to carve through the other support. But even as the sword swept down a spear streamed from a warrior's hand and thudded against Wes's right shoulder.

His sword jarred loose. It fell into the chasm.

"Thou art hurt!" cried the girl. Wes grinned wryly.

"Nay," he said, "but weaponless. Lead on!"

They were now on the other side of the chasm in the tunneled volcano.

The priests had hesitated a moment when the bridge had slackened; but now, seeing the weaponless man and girl disappear in a tortuous corridor ahead, they sidled across the damaged catwalk after their fierce leader.

"They will go past the Temple!" Hrihor shrilled. "It is Taia who leads him: again she tries to escape to the land of ice! Follow--up here!"

His words were true. The corridor that led by the Temple was the one which led to the only other pa.s.sage up to the crater of the volcano.

But Taia had guided Craig only a few steps past the place of worship, now a silent vault of impenetrable blackness when, turning a corner, the American felt her shrink back.

"Shabako comes!" she told him faintly.

Quickly he verified it. Led by the Pharaoh himself, a party of soldiers was coming down the corridor some thirty yards away. Even as Wes saw them, they saw him--and Shabako's roar of sudden alarm tingled his ears.

Priests behind, soldiers and the blood-l.u.s.tful Pharaoh ahead. They were cut off, blocked, trapped. There was no nearby branch pa.s.sage to run down; there was no way to turn. It was the end of the game.... But no, not quite, Craig told himself grimly. His sword was gone, but his fists would tell on them before he went down, before the paws of the idol finally claimed him....

He stepped before Taia, clenched his fists, and waited the shock of the charge.

He could see the fury in Shabako's narrowed eyes, so close were they, when a soft hand pulled him back. It was Taia's.

"Come!" she whispered, and darted swiftly back to the gloomy, shadow-filled entrance of the Temple. And wondering, Wes Craig followed.

She glided through the pillared portal and was immediately swallowed up by a shroud of silent, velvety darkness. Wes could not see her, but her soft hand touched his arm lightly to guide him forward, and he sensed the girl's warm body close to his. Where was she going?

Inevitably they would be trapped in the far end of the Temple, beneath the very hands of the idol--or so he thought. But he trusted her, and went on.

A shout came from the entrance. "They went in here!" someone cried, and the two heard Shabako detailing swift instructions to his men--instructions which were cut short by another clatter of feet and the approaching voice of Hrihor. Priests and soldiers had joined, a confusion of men, most of them hanging back, half afraid to venture into the well of blackness that was Aten's abode on earth.

But the Pharaoh whipped them into discipline with the harsh tones of his voice, and strung them into a close line, to advance slowly through the Temple. "Have thy blades ready!" he added. "They cannot escape us now: they are trapped. Forward!"

Nothing could get through that line. It was like a fine-toothed comb, with every tooth a man. Craig saw it coming, and knew that he and the girl could not go much farther back, for already he sensed himself directly beneath the looming figure of Aten. Yet the gentle touch led him on--around and past the idol into the furthermost corner of the Temple. It was then that Taia paused, felt around, and placed Craig's right hand upon some unseen k.n.o.b in the wall. Her faint whisper hurriedly explained the purpose of the k.n.o.b as Wes drank in her words eagerly.

"There is a secret room behind the idol, from whence the priests ape the G.o.d's voice and move his hands at sacrifice. A priest should be there e'en now, ready for the ceremony. Thou must overcome him, Divine One, and we too can hide therein. Hrihor dare not search for us there while others are present, for e'en Shabako knows not of the room.

Quick, then--they come! Thy hand is on the latch of the secret panel.

I follow thee!"

Wes pressed the girl's hand tightly and his body tensed. Then, without hesitation, he jerked the secret panel back. A faint glow of light lay ahead, and he plunged into the tiny room that lay revealed.

An alarmed face stared up--the priest! Wes leaped at him, his steely fingers thumbing into the man's throat and throttling its scream to a gasping choke. All the American's pent-up fury went into a lunge that the priest could not begin to stand against. He was bowled sharply over and went down. Craig on top, and there the fight ended as suddenly as it had begun. The priest's head thudded into the smooth rock floor; a convulsion quivered his body; he moaned and lay still.

A grim flicker in his eyes, Craig got up and looked around for Taia.

Then astonishment and cold fear swept through him.

The secret door was closed--but she was not inside!

"Now what--" Wesley Craig gasped.

He did not dare finish the thought. He glared around, much as a trapped tiger does, his brain a turmoil. His eyes fell on a ladder that led up from the floor to a niche in the left wall--a slit about forty feet high, a pool of darkness, shadowed from the thin tongue of flame that lit the room. Only half realizing what the slit was, Wes sprang forward and leaped up the ladder. A platform was built high up inside the niche, a place for a man to stand on. The American reached it, pressed himself forward, and peered through a tiny hole that was in the rock ahead. He knew it ought to command a view of the Temple.

But if it did, Craig could see nothing, for there was no light in the huge vault outside. For minutes the brooding silence was not broken, save by an occasional sc.r.a.ping sound made by one of the searching line of men. There was no hint of the girl who waited beside the hideous figure of the G.o.d, nor of the network that gradually closed in on her.

But suddenly the silence was shattered by a shout.

"I have her!" someone yelled. Then came a mult.i.tude of sounds. The piercing voice of Hrihor was audible above them all.

"Light the lamps! Hast thou the other, too?"

"Nay--he is not here."

"Not here? What--"

A spark of light made an erratic course from the Temple door: someone was bringing a flame to light the lamps. A moment later there was a flare of yellow light as the oil in a large wall lamp caught fire, and then the darkness melted further before a wave of light from the opposite wall. Now could be seen the warriors who, with gleaming outdrawn swords, were cl.u.s.tered around the girl. Shabako was gripping her arm and shaking her roughly: the High Priest was drawing to a stop before her, to stand glaring at her with hate-inflamed eyes.

"Tell us!" roared the Pharaoh. "Where is the man?"

She looked at him levelly. Her eyes were quite calm, and she breathed evenly. There was a glorious light in her eyes as she replied.

"I will tell thee," she said; "though thou wilt not comprehend. He vanished. Vanished, even as a G.o.d. He was here beside me, in the darkness and then suddenly he was gone. But why not? For he was a G.o.d...."

The soldiers gaped at her. Silence came down in the Temple. The High Priest did not break it, but only stared closely at the girl with eyes that suddenly had something more than hate in them--comprehension, and a trace of fear....

But the Pharaoh Shabako's eyes were only wrathful, and he shouted:

"A G.o.d? Vanished, sayest thou? Lies! Lies! But thou canst not lie to Aten! The G.o.d knows of a way to loosen thy tongue!"

Despite herself, Taia shuddered. She knew that way.