At the Queen's Mercy

It was near to midnight. I was weary, mind and body, for I had been urging the Queen to tell me plainly of the fate of my friends, and she had pleaded ignorance, and either could not or would not give me satisfaction.

To a reasonable man like myself it is a tedious process and one bearing little fruit, to thread the mazes of a woman’s mind, yet this had been my task, and after all these hours I now laid me to rest with the comfortable knowledge that I had perchance been cajoled, and at any rate altogether baffled.

Yet she was beautiful, my Queen, and I could not be wholly discontent. Her very contrariness was a charm, or would have been, had I felt less bondsman to the cause of my friends. And this was the more strange, in that I have always loved obedience in a woman, and reckoned docility the chief of female virtues.

I put this down that men may read. You that wonder at my folly may perchance go further and with less cause, when the touch of the blind god comes to you as to me. As for you who smile on, knowing no better, from your lonely height, you have missed wholly the inwardness of life and its savor, and so my pity may well match your own and with the greater reason.

Well, I have said that it was close to midnight when I sought my couch, and not five minutes after when I was wrapped in deepest slumber, therefore I cannot say when the scent of coming trouble filled my nostrils, or when the heavy burden of the foreknowledge of sorrow broke my rest. But this I do know: I breathed with difficulty. A heavy weight seemed pressing on my chest, and in the distance, even in my sleep, I heard a thunderous rumble as of the chariot wheels of the gods.

With that thought I woke, and waking, knew that the air was full of sulphur and that something lay across me, motionless, in the darkness. I put forth my strength and pushed the thing away, and it was cold, and it rolled from off the couch, and fell on the floor beside it, with a dull sound I liked but little.

The lamp that lit my chamber had gone out, and the slave that was wont to sleep at my feet had left his accustomed place. With a strange inward shrinking I passed my hand swiftly over the huddled shape on the pavement, and as I thus learned the sickening truth, a lurid flash of lightning showed the distorted features of him whom I had called, and proved the reason of his silence.

Then a clap of thunder shook the very Palace. I heard the shrill scream of a frightened woman, and I groped my way to the door. As I reached it, a dull red glare lit up faintly the stone corridor, and I saw that it came from without and through a loophole that pierced the massive wall.

There was an indescribable murmur also that was deadened by the thickness of outer stone of the fortress Palace. This murmur sounded to me very much like the angry hum of a horde of bees. Hurrying feet, bare of sandals, ran this way and that. The royal household was astir and affrighted.

Soon I saw again a blinding flash of blue light and heard the deafening peal of thunder that followed. All this time there was no sound of falling rain, but the air was heavy and stagnant and full of a curious mineral odor that stank in my nostrils.

Then as I groped my way onward through the tangled labyrinth that lay between me and the Queen, I felt a hand fall on my shoulder, and a voice spoke low in my ear through all the tumult. I turned, and the voice whined on, and in a moment I had caught the sense of that which it uttered.

“For behold, I have given gifts of price to the Temple, yet doth fire from heaven even now destroy my household. Woe is me! but the magic of the white stranger is strong. Follow, my lord, and I will lead you to your friends. So shall the shadow of your protecting mantle fall upon me, and my miserable life be spared.”

Thus the creature grovelled before me, and even as he spoke, a forked tongue of light struck a cornice above our heads, and a great fragment of carved stone fell at my feet.

I bade the whimpering fellow rise and be a man and lead me, as he valued his black skin, with all speed, to the dungeon where lay my comrade and the maid.

So at his word I turned me back once more, and, drawing my knife, I let the shivering wretch gaze on the bright polish of its metal, that he might forswear all thought of treachery. I think, however, that the deadly fear of the storm that consumed him would have kept him true.

At least, without mischance, he led me downward, by a way new to me, till at length, in the bowels of the earth, I rejoined my friends. It was a hasty, if a joyous, greeting that we gave one another. There was no time to lose. Astolba’s face told me that, as did the feverish pressure with which my good comrade Lestrade grasped my hands.

So with eloquent maledictions in the native tongue, and in round English, I swore the jailer, my trembling guide, to silence, and once again we three together began the business of escape.

Well for us that the friendly darkness covered us, and that before the dreadful onslaught of the storm the sentinels had fled. Our hard-earned knowledge of the network of dungeon, chamber, and corridor stood us in good stead; fear lent us strength and pricked us onward, and it was not long as we count by minutes before we paused for breath—we three together without the Palace, and so far safe, within the shadow of its wall.

Then it was that my heart sank like lead within my bosom. In the excitement of the flight, I had not thought of the Queen, and that escape meant farewell and forever.

One lives long in an hour like that, and in a flash I saw that I was bound to Lah by a stronger chain than any that could be forged by the word of a heathen priest before Edba’s altar.

But awful peril faced us, and if ever a maid needed the service of two stalwart men, such a one was Astolba, in the midst of this terrible danger alike from the heavens and from the beasts about us.

So, privately in the darkness, I kissed the ruby that lay upon my breast. This also I set down,—I care not who reads it,—and with the kiss I sealed a compact that led me from my desire to my duty.

Then I resolutely turned my back upon the Palace.

The dull roar was not so distant or so muffled now. It came from a maddened crowd that surged about the royal entrance gates.

Ghostly figures joined the mob, by twos and threes, showing not white, but black, against the red glare of burning buildings; and over all hung the sulphurous vapor; from above, peal upon peal of deafening thunder—the serpent flash of light.

The people of the Walled City were mad with fear, and in their terror lay our best pledge of safety. Lestrade supported the maid and tenderly urged her onward, and I in silence led the way, with naked sword to answer him who should unwisely question us.

My comrade bore with him such weapons as he had time to choose in our hasty flight, and Astolba, with a woman’s foresight, had carried from the cell provisions and a flask of water.

The secret door of the outer wall was near, and freedom within our grasp, but I took no joy of it. Lah’s face, beautiful and reproachful, rose before me and filled me with a mighty longing that would not be stilled. I even half hoped that we, or at least that I, would be challenged, captured, and so stand once more a prisoner in that queenly presence; but no man stayed us, and without let or hindrance we passed through the door in the wall, and stood once again beyond the boundaries of the City of the worshippers of Edba and of Hed.

But even in that moment the shrill voice of Hubla reached my ears, strangely broken with wild, strangling sobs, and though I knew it not, the voice of Hubla was the voice of fate. How or by what means she had tracked us, I cannot tell.

Lestrade, mindful of her past malice, strode forth quickly with upraised spear, but I withheld his hand.

There was no power for evil in the shrunken, huddled figure at my feet. Even her witch’s deviltry had fallen from her as a garment.

It was not the sorceress who clasped my knees, but an old old woman, half-mad with frantic grief and terror; and at her first words my blood leaped in my veins, for she bade me save the Queen.

I saw Astolba come forward from the shelter of Lestrade’s protecting arm, and as in a dream, I heard her, with a strange hardness in her voice, bid the red witch cease her lamentations, for she said coldly, “What is Lah’s fate to you?”

Then with something of her old fire, Hubla stood upright.

“What is the Queen to me?” she repeated, with scorn in look and tone. “For whom have I toiled? For whom have I betrayed the secrets of the gods? Who sits, by my contriving, upon the throne of Kings? For whom have I shed without mercy the blood of friend and foe? And she is all in all to me. The wrath of Edba and Hed strike me alone. I am their rightful victim; let them spare my child.”

“Your child!” I cried in amazement, but she turned upon me with her old savagery.

“And you, her lover, waste the time in idle words. You stand here prating, while the mob, maddened by the priests, fire the Palace and tear in pieces Lah, their Queen.”

I turned, stricken dumb by the horror of her words, and it was Lestrade who put the question that trembled on my lips.

“The hag is distraught or worse,” he said, with contempt. “Think not to cheat us by so clumsy a trick. Did not Agno himself at the wrestling do homage to the Queen?”

Hubla answered, but it was to me she spoke.

“If you have pity, hasten. By the gods I swear I tell nothing but the bare truth. This storm has set the people wild with fear, and the crafty priests have dared to say that Edba and Hed have sent it in punishment of the Queen’s sins. In mercy, come quickly, for the end is near.”

“And if we believe this likely tale,” sneered Lestrade, “what can one man do? what is my friend among so many?”

“The fire of the pit smite you!” raved the witch, beside herself with passion. Then once again she clung to me, beseeching, “Come; for she loves you.”

And I answered, “I will come.”

Then it was that Astolba spoke, and I knew not till then how pitiless can be a woman’s voice.

“Is this thing true?” she asked. “Promised to me as you are, do you love this woman?”

The lash of her scorn cut me like a knife, but I felt that the time for half-truths was over. So I said humbly but yet steadfastly, “I do not know. Nevertheless I cannot leave her to perish. Remember she has saved your life and mine.”

“Go then,” she cried bitterly. “We waste time. I thank Heaven there beats yet one loyal heart; one who will stand my friend. If we part here, it is forever.”

“Forever if it be your will,” I answered, with sad pride.

And with that I saw Lestrade draw the maid close, and together, without a word, they passed from me, and the darkness swallowed them; and I, turning, bade Hubla lead onward to the Queen.