 CHAPTER XXII THE CASTING OF THE SHADOW Now we were racing down toward that last span whose ancientness had set it apart from all the other soaring arches. The shells' speed slackened. We approached warily. "'We passed there?' asked O'Keefe. The green dwarf nodded, pointing to the right where the bridge ended in a broad platform held high upon two gigantic piers, between which ran a spur from the glistening road. Platform and bridge were swarming with men at arms. They crowded the parapets, looking down upon us curiously, but with no evidence of hostility . . . Rador drew a deep breath of relief. "'We don't have to break our way through, then?' There was disappointment in the Irishman's voice. "'No use, Larry!' smiling, Rador stopped the quarrel just beneath the arch and beside one of the piers. "'Now listen well. They have had no warning. Hence does Yolara still think us on the way to the temple. This is the gateway of the portal, and the gateway is closed by the shadow. Once I commanded here, and I know its laws. This must I do. By craft persuade Serku, the keeper of the gateway, to lift the shadow, or raise it myself. And that will be hard, and it may well be that in the struggle life will be stripped of us all. But is it better to die fighting than to dance with the shining one?' He swept the shell around the pier, opened a wide plaza paved with the volcanic glass, but black as that done which we had sped from the chamber of the moon-pool. It shone like a mirrored lakelet of jet. On each side of it arose what at first glance seemed towering bulwarks of the same ebb and obsidian. And second revealed themselves as structures hewn and set in place by men. Polished faces pierced by dozens of high, narrow windows. Down each facade a stairway fell, broken by small landings on which a door opened. They dropped to a broad ledge of gray stone edging the lip of this midnight pool, and upon it also fell two wide flights from either side of the bridge-platform. Among all four stairways the guards were ranged, and here and there against the ledge stood the shells, in a curiously comforting resemblance to parked motors in our own world. The somber walls balked high, curved and ended in two obelisk pillars from which, like a tremendous curtain, stretched a barrier of that tenebrous gloom, which, though weightless as shadow itself, I now knew to be as impenetrable as the veil between life and death. In this murk, unlike all others I had seen, I sensed movement, aquivering, a tremor, constant and rhythmic, not to be seen, yet caught by some subtle sense, as though through it beat a swift pulse of black light. The green dwarf turned the corial slowly to the edge at the right, crept cautiously on toward where, not more than a hundred feet from the barrier, a low wide entrance opened in the fort. Guardian-threshold stood two guards, armed with broadswords, double-handed, terminating in a wide lunette mouthed with murderous fangs. These they raised in salute, and through the portal strode a dwarf huge as Rador, dressed as he and carrying only the poignard that was the badge of office of Muria's captainry. The green dwarf swept the shell expertly against the ledge, leaped out. "'Greeting, Sirku,' he answered. I was but looking for the courier of Lakla." "'Lakla,' exclaimed Sirku. Why, the handmaiden passed with her aqqa, naya vah go. Past,' the astonishment of the green dwarf was so real, that half was I myself deceived. You let her pass?' "'Certainly I let her pass.' But under the green dwarf's stern gaze the truculence of the Guardian faded. "'Why should I not?' he asked apprehensively. "'Because Yolara commanded otherwise,' answered Rador coldly. "'There came no command to me!' Little beads of sweat stood out on Sirku's forehead. "'Sirku,' interrupted the green dwarf swiftly. "'Truly is my heart rung for you. This is a matter of Yolara and of Lugor and the Council, yes, even of the shining one. And the message was sent, and the fate may have of all Muria rested upon your obedience, and the return of Lakla with these strangers to the Council. Now truly is my heart rung, for there are few I would less like to see dance with the shining one than you, Sirku,' he added softly. Livid now was the Gateway's Guardian, his great frame shaking. "'Come with me and speak to Yolara,' he pleaded. "'There came no message. Tell her!' "'Wait, Sirku!' There was a thrill as of inspiration in Rador's voice. This quarrel is of the swiftest. Laklas are of the slowest. With Lakla, scarce of Va ahead, we can reach her before she enters the portal. "'Lift you the shadow. We will bring her back, and this I will do for you, Sirku.' Doubt tempered Sirku's panic. "'Why not go alone, Rador, leaving the strangers here with me?' he asked, and I thought, not unreasonably. "'Nay, then,' the green dwarf was brusque, Lakla will not return unless I carry to her these men as evidence of our good faith. "'Come, we will speak to Yolara, and she shall judge you.' He started away, but Sirku caught his arm. "'No, Rador, no,' he whispered, again panic-stricken. "'Go you, as you will, but bring her back. Speed, Rador!' He sprang toward the entrance. I lift the shadow.' Into the green dwarf's poise crept a curious, almost a listening alertness. He leaped to Sirku's side. "'I go with you,' I heard. "'Some little I can tell you.' They were gone.' "'Fine work,' muttered Larry. "'Nominated for a citizen of Ireland when we get out of this, one Rador of...' The shadow trembled, shuttered into nothingness. The obelisked outposts that had held it framed a ribbon of roadway, high-banked with verger, vanishing in green distances. And then from the portal sped a shriek, a death-cry. It cut through the silence of the ebb and pit like a whimpering arrow. Before it had died down the stairways came pouring the guards. Those at the threshold raised their swords and peered within. Abruptly Rador was between them. Rador dropped his hilt and grabbed him, the green dwarf's poignards flashed and was buried in his throat. Down upon Rador's head swept the second blade. A flame leaped from O'Keeffe's hand and the sword seemed to fling itself from its wielder's grasp. Another flash and the soldier crumpled. Rador threw himself into the shell, darted to the high seat and straight between the pillars of the shadow we flew. There came a crackling, a darkness of vast wings flinging down upon us. The quarry's flight was checked as by a giant's hand. The shell swerved sickeningly. There was an oddly metallic splintering. It quivered, shot ahead. Dizzily I picked myself up and looked behind. The shadow had fallen, but too late, a bare instant too late. Shrinking as we fled from it, still it seemed to strain like some fettered afreet from Eblis, throbbing with wrath, seeking with every malign power it possessed to break its bonds and pursue. Not until long after were we to know that it had been the dying hand of Serku, groping out of oblivion that had casted after us as a fowler upon an escaping bird. Snappy work, Rador! It was Larry speaking, but they cut the end off your bus all right. A full quarter of the hindward whirl was gone, sliced off cleanly. Rador noted it with anxious eyes. That is bad, he said, but not too bad perhaps. All depends upon how closely Lugor and his men can follow us. He raised a hand to O'Keefe in salute. But to you, Larry, I owe my life. Not even the Keth could have been as swift to save me as that death-flame of yours, friend. The Irishman waved an airy hand. Serku, the green dwarf drew from his girdle the blood-stained poignard. Serku, I was forced to slay. Even as he raised the shadow, the globe gave the alarm. Lugor follows with twice ten times ten of his best. He hesitated. Though we have escaped the shadow, it has taken toll of our swiftness. May we reach the portal before it closes upon Lakla. But if we do not... He paused again. Well, I know a way, but it is not the one I am gay to follow. No. He snapped open the aperture that held the ball flaming within the dark crystal, peered at it anxiously. I crept to the torn end of the corial. The edges were crumbling, disintegrated. They powdered in my fingers, like dust. Mystified still, I crept back where Larry, sheer happiness pouring from him, was whistling softly and polishing up his automatic. His gaze fell upon Olaf's grim, sad face and softened. Back up, Olaf, he said. We've got a good fighting chance. Once we link up with Lakla and her crowd, I'm bettin' that we get your wife. Never doubt it. The baby... he hesitated awkwardly. The Norseman's eyes filled. He stretched a hand to the O'Keefe. The yearning. She is of the dode. He half whispered. Of the blessed dead. For her I have no fear, and for her vengeance will be given me. Yeah, but my Helma. She is of the dead alive, like toes we saw whirling like leaves in the light of the shining devil. And I would that she too were off the dead. And at rest. I do not know how to fight the shining devil, no. His bitter despair welled up in his voice. Olaf, Larry's voice was gentle. Well, come out on top. I know it. Remember one thing. All this stuff that seems so strange, and... and, well, sort of supernatural. Is just a lot of tricks we're not hept to as yet. Why, Olaf, suppose you took a Fijian when the war was on, and set him suddenly down in London, with autos rushin' past, sirens blowin', arches poppin', a dozen enemy planes droppin' bombs, and a searchlight shootin' all over the sky? Wouldn't he think he was among thirty-third degree devils in some exclusive circle of hell? Sure he would. And yet everything we saw would be natural, just as natural as all this is, once we get the answer to it. Not that we're Fijians, of course, but the principle is the same. The Norseman considered this, nodding gravely. Yah! he answered at last. And at least we can fight. That is why I have turned to Thor of the battles, yah! And one have I hope in for mine Helma, the White Maiden. Since I have turned to the old gods, it has been made clear to me that I shall slay Lugor and that the Hicks, the evil witch Yolara, shall also die. But I would talk with the White Maiden. All right, said Larry, but just don't be afraid of what you don't understand. There's another thing, he hesitated nervously. There's another thing that may startle you a bit when we meet up with Lakla. Her, our, frogs. Like the frog-woman we saw on the wall, asked Olaf. Yes, went on Larry rapidly. It's this way. I figure that the frogs grow rather large where she lives, and they're a bit different too. Well, Lakla's got a lot of them trained. Carry spears and clubs, and all that junk, just like trained seals or monkeys are so on in the circus. Probably a custom of the place. Nothing queer about that, Olaf. Why, people have all kinds of pets. Our meddillos and snakes and rabbits, kangaroos and elephants and tigers. Remembering how the frog-woman had struck in Larry's mind from the outset, I wondered whether all this was not more to convince himself than Olaf. Why, I remember a nice girl in Paris who had four pet pythons. He went on. But I listen no more. For now I was sure of my surmise. The road had begun to thrust itself through high flung, sharply pinnacled masses, and rounded outcroppings of rock, on which clung patches of the amber moss. The trees had utterly vanished, and studying the moss-carpeted plains were only clumps of a willowy shrub from which hung, light grapes, clusters of white waxen blooms. The light too had changed. Gone were the dancing, sparkling atoms, and the silver had faded to a soft, almost ashen grayness. Ahead of us marched a rampart of coppery cliffs, rising, like all these mountainous walls we had seen, into the immensities of haze. Something long drifting in my subconsciousness turned to startled realization. The speed of the shell was slackening. The aperture containing the ionizing mechanism was still open. I glanced within. The whirling ball of fire was not dimmed. But its coruscations, instead of pouring down through the cylinder, swirled and eddied and shot back as though trying to re-enter their source. Rador nodded grimly. The shadow takes its toll, he said. We topped a rise. Larry gripped my arm. Look! he cried and pointed. Far, far behind us, so far, that the road was but a glistening thread. A score of shining points came speeding. Lugor and his men, said Rador. Can't you step on her? asked Larry. Step on her! repeated the green dwarf, puzzled. Give her more speed! Push her! explained O'Keefe. Rador looked about him. The coppery ramparts were close, not more than three or four miles distant. In front of us the plane lifted in a long rolling swell, and up this the quarry all assayed to go, with a terrifying lessening of speed. Faintly behind us came shootings, and we knew that Lugor drew close. Nor anywhere was there a sign of Lakla nor her frogmen. Now we were half way to the crest. The shell barely crawled, and from beneath it came a faint hissing. It quivered, and I knew that its base was no longer held above the glassy surface, but rested on it. One last chance, exclaimed Rador. He pressed upon the control lever, and wrenched it from its socket. Instantly the sparkling ball expanded, whirling with prodigious rapidity, and sending a cascade of coruscations into the cylinder. The shell rose, leaped through the air. The dark crystal split into fragments. The fiery ball dulled, died, but upon the impetus of that last thrust we reached the crest. Poised there for a moment I caught a glimpse of the road dropping down the side of an enormous moss-covered, bowl-shaped valley, who sharply curved sides ended abruptly at the base of the towering barrier. Then, down the steep, powerless to guide or to check the shell, we plunged in a meteor rush straight for the annihilating adamantine breasts of the cliffs. Now the quick thinking of Larry's air-training came to our aid. As the rampart reared close, he threw himself upon Rador, hurled him and himself against the side of the flying whirl. Under the shock the finely balanced machine swerved from its course. It struck the soft, low bank of the road, shot high in the air, bounded on through the thick carpeting, whirled like a dervish, and fell upon its side. Shot from it, we rolled for yards, but the moss saved broken bones or serious bruise. Quick! cried the green dwarf. He seized an arm, dragged me to my feet, began running to the cliff-base not a hundred feet away. Beside us raced O'Keefe and Olaf. At our left was the black road. It stopped abruptly, was cut off by a slab of polished crimson stone a hundred feet high, and as wide, set within the coppery face of the barrier. On each side of it stood pillars, cut from the living rock, and immense almost as those which held the rainbow veil of the dweller. Across its face weaved unnamable carvings, but I had no time for more than a glance. The green dwarf gripped my arm again. Quick! he cried again. The handmaiden has passed! At the right of the portal ran a low wall of shattered rock. Over this we raced like rabbits. Hidden behind it was a narrow path. Crouching, Rador in the lead, we sped along it. Three hundred, four hundred yards we raced, and the path ended in a cul-de-sac. To our ears was borne a louder shouting. The first of the pursuing shells had swept over the lip of the great bowl, poised for a moment as we had, and then began a cautious descent. Within it, scanning the slopes, I saw Lugor. A little closer, and I'll get him, whispered Larry viciously. He raised his pistol. His hand was caught in a mighty grip. Rador, eyes blazing, stood beside him. No! rasped the green dwarf. He heaved a shoulder against one of the boulders that formed the pocket. It rocked aside, revealing a slit. In, ordered he, straining against the weight of the stone, O'Keefe slipped through, Olaf at his back, eye following. With a lightning leap the dwarf was beside me, the huge rock missing him by a hair breath as it swung into place. We were in Samaritan darkness. I fell for my pocket-flash and recalled with distress that I had left it behind with my medicine-kit when we fled from the gardens. But Rador seemed to need no light. Grip hands, he ordered. We crept single file, holding to each other like children, through the black. At last the green dwarf paused. Await me here, he whispered, do not move, and for your lives be silent. And he was gone. End of Chapter 22, Chapter 23 of The Moon Pool, by Abraham Merritt. This Librivox recording is in the public domain. The Moon Pool, Chapter 23, Dragon Worm and Moss Death. For a small eternity, to me at least, we waited. Then as silent as ever the green dwarf returned. It is well, he said, some of the strain gone from his voice. Grip hands again and follow. Wait a bit, Rador. This was Larry. Does Lugar know this side entrance? If he does, why not let Olaf and me go back to the opening and pick them off as they come in? We could hold the lot, and in the meantime you and Goodwin could go after Lakla for help. Lugar knows the secret of the portal, if he dare use it, answered the captain with a curious indirection. And now that they have challenged the silent ones, I think he will dare. Also, he will find our tracks, and it may be that he knows this hidden way. Well, for God's sake, O'Keefe's appalled bewilderment was almost ludicrous. If he knows all that, and you knew all that, why didn't you let me click him when I had the chance? Larry, the green dwarf, was oddly humble. It seemed good to me, too, at first, and then I heard a command, heard it clearly, to stop you, that Lugar die not now, lest a greater vengeance fail. Command, from whom? The Irishman's voice distilled out of the blackness the very essence of bewilderment. I thought, Rador was whispering, I thought it came from the silent ones. Superstition, groaned O'Keefe in utter exasperation. Always superstition. What can you do against it? Never mind, Rador. His sense of humor came to his aid. It's too late now, anyway. Where do we go from here, O' Dare? He laughed. We tread the path of one I am not feigned to meet, answered Rador. But if meet we must, point the death-tubes at the pale shield he bears upon his throat, and send the flame into the flower of cold fire that is its center, nor look into his eyes. Again Larry gasped, and I with him. It's getting too deep for me, Doc, he muttered dejectedly. Can you make head or tail of it? No, I answered, shortly enough. But Rador fears something, and that's his description of it. Sure, he replied, only it's a code I don't understand. I could feel his grin. All right, for the flower of cold fire, Rador, and I won't look into his eyes. He went on cheerfully. But had we better be moving? Come, said the soldier, again hand in hand we went blindly on. O'Keefe was muttering to himself. Flower of cold fire, don't look into his eyes. Some joint. Damn superstition. Then he chuckled, and caroled softly. O mama, pinnacled rose on me, Two young frogmen are in love with me, Shut my eyes so I can't see. Sh! Rador was warning. He began whispering. For half a vah we go along a way of death. From its peril we pass into another, Against whose dangers I can guard you. But in part this is in view of the roadway, And it may be that Lugor will see us. If so, we must fight as best we can. If we pass these two roads safely, Then is the way to the crimson sea clear, Nor need we fear Lugor nor any. And there is another thing that Lugor does not know. When he opens the portal, the silent ones will hear, And Lak'la and the Aka will be swift to greet its opener. Rador, I asked, how know you all this? The handmaiden is my sister's child, he answered quietly. O'Keefe drew a long breath. Uncle, he remarked casually in English, Made the man who is going to be your nephew. And thereafter he never addressed the green dwarf, Except by the avuncular title, Which Rador, humorously enough, apparently conceived to be one of respectful endearment. For me a light broke. Plain now was the reason for his foreknowledge of Lak'la's appearance at the feast, Where Larry had so narrowly escaped Yolara's spells. Plain, the determining factor, that had cast his lot with ours, And, my confidence, despite his discourse of mysterious perils, Experienced a remarkable quickening. Speculation as to the market differences in pigmentation and appearance of niece and uncle Was dissipated by my consciousness that we were now moving in a dim half-light. We were in a fairly wide tunnel. Not far ahead, the gleam filtered pale yellow, like sunlight sifting through the leaves of autumn poplars. And as we drove closer to its source, I saw that it did indeed pass through a leafy screen hanging over the passage-end. This Rador drew aside cautiously, beckoned us, and we stepped through. It appeared to be a tunnel cut through soft green mold. Its base was a flat strip of pathway, a yard wide from which the walls curved out in perfect cylindrical form, smoothed and evened with utmost nicety. Thirty feet wide they were at their widest, then drew toward each other with no break in their symmetry. They did not close. Above was, roughly, a ten-foot rift, ragged edged, through which poured light, like that in the heart of pale amber, a butter-cup light shot through with curiously evanescent bronze shadows. Quick, commanded Rador, uneasily, and set off at a sharp pace. Now, my eyes accustomed to the strange light, I saw that the tunnel's walls were of moss. In them I could trace fringe leaf and curly leaf, pressings of enormous bladder cups, physcomitrium, immense splashes of what seemed to be the scarlet-crested cladonia, traceries of huge moss veils, crushings of teeth, peristomy, gigantic, spore cases brown and white, saffron and ivory, hot vermillions and cerulean blues, pressed into an astounding mosaic by some titanic force. Hurry! it was Rador calling. I had lagged behind. He quickened the pace to a half run. We were climbing, panting. The amber light grew stronger, the rift above us wider, the tunnel curved. On the left a narrow cleft appeared. The green dwarf leaped toward it, thrust us within, pushed us ahead of him up a steep, rocky fissure, well nigh indeed a chimney. Up and up this we scrambled until my lungs were bursting, and I thought I could climb no more. The crevice ended. We crawled out and sank, even Rador, upon a little leaf-carpeted clearing circled by lacy tree-ferns. Gasping, legs aching, we lay prone, relaxed, drawing back strength and breath. Rador was first to rise. Thrice he bent low as an homage. Then— Give thanks to the silent ones, for their power has been over us, he exclaimed. Dimly I wondered what he meant. Something about the fern leaf at which I had been staring aroused me. I leaped to my feet and ran to its base. This was no fern, no. It was fern moss. The largest of its species I had ever found in tropic jungles had not been more than two inches high, and this was twenty feet. The scientific fire I had experienced in the tunnel returned uncontrollable. I parted the fronds, gazed out. My outlook commanded a vista of miles, and that vista, a fatta morgana of plantum, a land of flowered sorcery. Forests of tree-high mosses spangled over with blooms of every conceivable shape and color. Cataracts and clusters, avalanches and nets of blossoms and pastels, indulled metallics, in gorgeous flamboyant hues. Some of them phosphorescent and shining like living jewels. Some sparkling as though with dust of opals, of sapphires, of rubies and topazes and emeralds. Thickets of convulvuli, like the trumpets of the seven archangels of Mara, King of Illusion, which are shaped from the bows of splendors arching his highest heaven. And moss veils, like banners of a marching host of titans, penins and bannerettes of the sunset, gonfalons of the gene, webs of fairy, or of flames of elfland. Springing up through that polychromatic flood, myriads of pedicles, slender and straight as spears, or soaring in spirals, or curving with undulations gracyl as the white serpents of tannet in the ancient Carthaginian groves, and all surmounted by a fantasy of spore cases in shapes of minaret and turret, domes and spires and cones, caps of frigia and bishops mitres, shapes grotesque and unnameable, shapes delicate and lovely. They hung high, poised, nodding and swaying, like goblins hovering over Titania's court, cacophony of Cathay accenting the flower-maiden music of Parsifal, bizarrerie of the angled, fantastic beings that peopled the Javan pantheon, watching a bacchanal of hurries in Mohammed's paradise. Down upon it all poured the amber light, dimmed in the distances by huge, drifting darkenings lurid as the flying mantles of the hurricane, and through the light, like showers of jewels, myriads of birds, darting, dipping, soaring, and still other myriads of gigantic, shimmering butterflies. A sound came to us, reaching out like the first faint susiris of the incoming tide, sighing, sighing, growing stronger. Now its mournful whispering quivered all about us, shook us, then passing like a presence, dyed away in far distances. The portal, said Rador, Lugor has entered. Peering with him we saw the barrier through which we had come, stretching verger-covered walls for miles, three or more away. Like a mould-burrow in a garden stretch the trail of the tunnel. Here and there we could look down within the rift at its top. Far off in it I thought I saw the glint of spears. They come, whispered Rador, quick, we must not meet them here. And then—holy, St. Brigid, gasped Larry. From the rift in the tunnel's continuation, nigh a mile beyond the cleft through which we had fled, lifted a crown of horns, of tentacles, erect, alert, of model gold and crimson, lifted higher, and from a monstrous scarlet head beneath them blaze two enormous aboid eyes, their depths wells of purplish phosphorescence, higher still, noseless, earless, chinless, a livid worm-mouth from which a slender scarlet tongue leaped like playing flames. Slowly it rose, its mighty neck querished with gold and scarlet scales, from whose polished surfaces the amber light glinted like flakes of fire, and under this neck shimmered something like a palely luminous silvery shield guarding it. The head of horror mounted, and in the shield center, full ten feet across, glowing, flickering, shining out, coldly, was a rose of white flame, a flower of cold fire, even as Rador had said. Now swiftly the thing upreared, standing like a scaled tower a hundred feet above the rift, its eyes scanning that movement I had seen along the course of its lair. There was a hissing. The crown of horns fell, whipped and writhed like the tentacles of an octopus. The towering length dropped back. Quick gasped Rador, and threw the fern moss along the path and down the other side of the steep we raced. Behind us for an instant there was a rushing as of a torrent, a faraway, faint, agonized screaming. Silence. No fear now from those who followed, whispered the green dwarf, pausing. St. Patrick. O'Keefe gazed ruminatively at his automatic. And he expected me to kill that with this. Well, as Fergus O'Connor said when they sent him out to slaughter a wild bull with a potato knife, you'll never realize how I appreciate the confidence you show in me. What was it, Doc? he asked. The dragon worm, Rador said. It was Herve de Horme, the hella worm, groaned Olaf. There you go again, blazed Larry. But the green dwarf was hurrying down the path and swiftly we followed, Larry muttering, Olaf mumbling behind me. The green dwarf was signaling us for caution. He pointed through a break in the grove of fifty-foot cedar mosses. We were skirting the glassy road. Scanning it, we found no trace of Lugor and wondered whether he too had seen the worm and had fled. Quickly we passed on. Drew away from the choreopath. The mosses began to thin, less and less they grew, giving way to low clumps that barely offered a shelter. Unexpectedly another screen of fern moss stretched before us. Slowly Rador made his way through it and stood hesitating. The scene in front of us was oddly weird and depressing. In some indefinable way, dreadful. Why, I could not tell, but the impression was plain. I shrank from it. Then, self-analysing, I wondered whether it could be the uncanny resemblance the heaps of curious mossy fungi scattered about had to beast and bird. Yes, and to man, that was the cause of it. Our path ran between a few of them. To the left they were thick. They were veridescent, almost metallic-hued, verde, antique. Curiously, indeed, were they like distorted images of dog and deer-like forms, of birds, of dwarfs, and here and there, the simulacra of giant frogs, spore cases, yellowish-green, as large as mitres and much resembling them in shape protruded from the heaps. My repulsion grew into a distant nausea. Rador turned to us a face wider far than that with which he had looked upon the dragon-worm. Now, for your lives, he whispered, tread softly here as I do, and speak not at all. He stepped forward on tiptoe, slowly, with utmost caution. We crept after him, passed the heaps beside the path, and as I passed my skin crept, and I shrank and saw the others shrink, too, with that unnameable loathing. Nor did the green dwarf pause until we had reached the brow of a small hillock a hundred yards beyond. And he was trembling. Now what are we up against, grumbled O'Keefe. The green dwarf stretched a hand, stiffened, gazed over to the left of us beyond a lower hillock upon whose broad crest lay a file of the moss shapes. They fringed it, their mitres having a grotesque appearance of watching what lay below. The glistening road lay there, and from it came a shout. A dozen of the chorea clustered, filled with Lugor's men, and in one of them Lugor himself, laughing wickedly. There was a rush of soldiers, and up the low hillock raced a score of them toward us. Run! shouted Rador. Not much, grunted Larry, and took swift aim at Lugor. The automatic spat. Olaf's echoed. Both bullets went wild, for Lugor, still laughing, threw himself into the protection of the body of his shell. But following the shots, from the file of moss heaps on the crest, came a series of muffled explosions. Under the pistol's concussions the mitred caps had burst, and instantly, all about the running soldiers grew a cloud of tiny, glistening, white spores, like a little cloud of puffball dust many times magnified. Through this cloud I glimpsed their faces, stricken with agony. Some turned to fly, but before they could take a second step stood rigid. The spore cloud drifted and eddyed about them, rain down on their heads and half bare breasts, covered their garments, and swiftly they began to change. Their features grew indistinct, merged. The glistening white spores that covered them turned to a pale yellow, grew greenish, spread and swelled, darkened. The eyes of one of the soldiers glinted for a moment, and then they were covered by the swift growth. Where but a few moments before had been men were only grotesque heaps, swiftly melting, swiftly rounding into the semblance of the mounds that lay behind us, and already beginning to take on their gleam of ancient veridescence. The Irishman was gripping my arm fiercely. The pain brought me back to my senses. Oh, laugh's right, he gasped. This is hell. I'm sick." And he was, frankly, and without restraint. Lugor and his others, awakened from their nightmare, piled into the courier, wheeled and raced away. On, said Rador, thickly, two perils have we passed. The silent ones watch over us. Soon we were again among the familiar and so unfamiliar moss giants. I knew what I had seen, and this time Larry could not call me superstitious. In the jungles of Borneo I had examined that other swiftly developing fungus which wreaks the vengeance of some of the hill-tribes upon those who steal their women, gripping with its microscopic hooks into the flesh, sending quick, tiny rootlets through the skin down into the capillaries, sucking life and thriving and never to be torn away until the living thing it clings to has been sapped dry. Here was but another of the species in which the development's rate was incredibly accelerated. Some of this I tried to explain to O'Keeffe as we sped along, reassuring him. But they turned to moss before our eyes, he said. Again I explained, patiently, but he seemed to derive no comfort at all from my assurances that the phenomena were entirely natural and aside from their more terrifying aspect of peculiar interest to the botanist. I know, was all he would say, but suppose one of those things had burst while we were going through, God! I was wondering how I could, with comparative safety, study the fungus when Rador stopped. In front of us was again the road-ribbon. Now is all danger past, he said. The way lies open, and Lugor has fled. There was a flash from the road. It passed me like a little lariat of light. It struck Larry squarely between the eyes, spread over his face, and drew itself within. Down! cried Rador, and hurled me to the ground. My head struck sharply. I felt myself grow faint. Ola fell beside me. I saw the green dwarf draw down the O'Keefe. He collapsed, limply, face still, eyes staring. A shout, and from the roadway poured a host of Lugor's men. I could hear Lugor bellowing. There came a rush of little feet. Soft, fragrant draperies brushed my face. Dimly I watched Lakla bend over the Irishman. She straightened. Her arm swept out, and the writhing vine, with its tenderled heads of ruby bloom, five flames of misty incandescence leaped into the faces of the soldiers now close upon us. It darted at their throats, striking, coiling, and striking again, coiling and uncoiling with incredible rapidity, and flying from leverage points of throats, of faces, of breasts, like a spring endowed with consciousness, volition and hatred. And those it struck stood rigid as stone, with faces, masks of inhuman fear and anguish, and those still unstriken fled. Another rush of feet, and down upon Lugor's faces poured the frogmen, their booming giant leading, thrusting with their lances, tearing and rending with talons and fangs and spurs. Against that onslaught the dwarfs could not stand. They raced for the shells. I heard Lugor shouting menacingly, and then Lakla's voice, peeling like a golden bugle of wrath. Go, Lugor! she cried. Go! That you and your Lara and your shining one may die together. Death for you, Lugor! Death for you all! Remember, Lugor! Death! There was a great noise within my head, no matter Lakla was here, Lakla here, but too late. Lugor had outplayed us. Moss death, nor dragon worm, had frightened him away. He had crept back to trap us. Lakla had come too late. Larry was dead, Larry. But I had heard no banshee wailing, and Larry had said he could not die without that warning. No, Larry was not dead. So ran the turbulent current of my mind. A horny arm lifted me. Two enormous, oddly gentle saucer eyes were staring into mine. My head rolled. I caught a glimpse of the golden girl kneeling beside the O'Keefe. The noise in my head grew thunderous, was carrying me away on its thunder, swept me into soft, blind darkness. End of Chapter 23 Chapter 24 of The Moon Pool by Abraham Merritt This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. The Moon Pool Chapter 24 The Crimson Sea I was in the heart of a rose pearl, swinging, swinging. No, I was in a rosy dawn cloud, pendulous in space. Consciousness flooded me. In reality, I was in the arms of one of the manfrogs, carrying me as though I were a babe, and we were passing through some place effused with glow enough, like heart of pearl, or dawn cloud, to justify my awakening vagaries. Just ahead walked Lakla in earnest talk with Rador, and content enough was I for a time to watch her. She had thrown off the metallic robes. Her thick braids of golden brown hair, with their flame-glince of bronze, were twined in a high coronal meshed in silken net of green. Little clustering curls escaped from it, clinging to the nape of the proud white neck, shyly kissing it. From her shoulders fell a loose, sleeveless garment of shimmering green, belted with a high golden girdle. Skirt folds dropping barely below the knees. She had cast aside her buskins, too, and the slender, high-arched feet were sandaled. Between the buckled edges of her curdle I caught gleams of translucent ivory, as exquisitely molded, as delectively rounded, as those revealed so naively beneath the hem. Something was knocking at the doors of my consciousness, some tragic thing. What was it? Larry! Where was Larry? I remembered, raised my head abruptly, saw at my side another frog-man carrying O'Keefe, and behind him Olaf, step-instinct with grief, following like some faithful, wistful dog who has lost a loved master. Upon my movement the monster bearing me halted, looked down inquiringly, uttered a deep, booming note that held the quality of interrogation. Lakla turned. The clear golden eyes were sorrowful, the sweet mouth drooping, but her loveliness, her gentleness, that undefinable synthesis of all her tender self that seemed always to circle her with an atmosphere of lucid normality lulled my panic. Drink this, she commanded, holding a small vial to my lips. Its contents were aromatic, unfamiliar, but astonishingly effective. For as soon as they passed my lips I felt a surge of strength, consciousness was restored. Larry, I cried, is he dead? Lakla shook her head, her eyes were troubled. No, she said, but he is like one dead, and yet unlike. Put me down, I demanded of my bearer. He tightened his hold, round eyes upon the golden girl. She spoke, insonorous, reverberating monosyllables, and I was set upon my feet. I leaped to the side of the Irishman. He laid limp with a disquieting, abnormal sequasity, as though every muscle were utterly flaccid, the antithesis of the rigor mortis, thank God, but terrifyingly toward the other end of its arc, a syncope I had never known. The flesh was stone cold, the pulse barely perceptible, long intervaled, the respiration undiscoverable, the pupils of the eyes were enormously dilated, it was as though life had been drawn from every nerve. A light flashed from the road, it struck his face and seemed to sink in, I said. I saw, answered Rador, but what it was, I know not, and I thought I knew all the weapons of our rulers. He glanced at me curiously. Some talk there has been that the stranger who came with you, double-tongue, was making new death-tools for Lugur, he ended. Marikinov, the Russian at work already in his storehouse of devastating energies, fashioning the weapons for his plots, the apocalyptic vision swept back upon me. He is not dead, Lakla's voice was poignant. He is not dead, and the three have wondrous healing. They can restore him, if they will, and they will, they will. For a moment she was silent. Now their gods help Lugur and Yolara, she whispered, for come what may, whether the silent ones be strong or weak, if he dies surely shall I fall upon them, and I will slay those two, yea, though I too perish. Yolara and Lugur shall both die, Olaf's eyes were burning, but Lugur is mine to slay. That pity I had seen before in Lakla's eyes when she looked upon the Norsemen banished the white wrath from them. She turned, half hurriedly, as though to escape his gaze. Walk with us, she said to me, unless you are still weak. I shook my head and gave a last look at O'Keeffe. There was nothing I could do. I stepped beside her. She thrust a white arm into mine protectingly, the wonderfully molded hand with its long tapering fingers catching about my wrist, my heart glowed toward her. Your medicine is potent, handmaiden, I answered, and the touch of your hand would give me strength enough, even had I not drunk it, I added in Larry's best manner. Her eyes danced, trouble flying. Now that was well spoken for such a man of wisdom as Rador tells me you are, she laughed, and a little pang shot through me. Could not a lover of science present a compliment without it always seeming to be as unusual as plucking a damask rose from a cabinet of fossils? Mustering my philosophy, I smiled back at her. Again I noted that broad, classic brow, with the little tendrils of shining bronze caressing it. The tilted, delicate, nut-brown brows that gave a curious touch of innocent diablory to the lovely face, flower-like, pure, high bread, a touch of rogishness, subtly alluring, sparkling over the maiden Madonna-ness that lay ever like a delicate, luminous suggestion beneath it. The long, black, curling lashes, the tender, rounded, bare, left breast. I have always liked you, she murmured naively, since first I saw you, in that place where the shining one goes forth into your world. And I am glad you like my medicine, as well as that you carry in the black box that you left behind, she added swiftly. How know you of that, La-Cla, I gasped. Offed and offed I came to him there, and to you, while you lay sleeping. How call you him? she paused. Larry, I said. Larry, she repeated it excellently. And you? Goodwin, said Rador. I bowed quite as though I were being introduced to some charming young lady met in that old life, now seemingly eons removed. Yes, Goodwin, she said. Offed and offed I came. Sometimes I thought you saw me. And he? Did he not dream of me some time? she asked wistfully. He did, I said, and watched for you. Then amazement grew vocal. But how came you, I asked? By a strange road, she whispered, to see that all was well with him, and to look into his heart, for I feared Yolara and her beauty. But I saw that she was not in his heart. A blush burned over her, turning even the little bare breast rosy. It is a strange road, she went on hurriedly. Many times have I followed it, and watched the shining one bear back its prey to the blue pool, seeing the woman he seeks. She made a quick gesture toward Olaf. And a babe cast from her arms in the last pang of her mother love. Seeing another woman throw herself into the shining one's embrace to save a man she loved. And I could not help. Her voice grew deep, thrilled. The friend, it comes to me. Who drew you here, Goodwin? She was silent, walking as one who sees visions and listens to voices unheard by others. Rador made a warning gesture. I crowded back my questions, glanced about me. We were passing over a smooth strand, hard-packed, as some beach of long, thrust-back ocean. It was like crushed garnets, each grain stained deep red, faintly sparkling. On each side were distances, the floor stretching away into them bare of vegetation, stretching on and on into infinitudes of rosy mist, even as did the space above. Flanking and behind us marched the giant patrachians, five score of them at least. Black scale and crimson scale, lustrous and gleaming in the rosacious radiance. Saucer eyes shining circles of phosphorescence, green, purple, red. Spurs clicking as they crouched along with a gait at once grotesque and formidable. Ahead the mist deepened into a ruddier glow. Through it a long, dark line began to appear. The mouth I thought of the caverned space through which we were going. It was just before us, over us. We stood bathed in a flood of rubescence. A sea stretched before us, a crimson sea, gleaming like that lost lacquer of royal coral, and the flame dragon's blood, which Fu's sea set upon the bower he built for his stolen sunmaiden, that going toward it she might think at the sun itself rising over the summer seas. Unmoved by wave or ripple, it was placent as some deep woodland pool when night rushes up over the world. It seemed molten, or as though some hand great enough to rock earth had distilled here from conflagrations of autumn sunsets their flaming essences. A fish broke through, large as a shark, blunt-headed, flashing bronze, ridged and mailed as though with serrate plates of armor. It leaped high, shaking from it a sparkling spray of rubies. Dropped and shot up a geyser of fiery gems. Across my line of vision, moving stately over the sea, floated a half-globe, luminous, diaphanous, its iridescence melting into turquoise, thence to amethyst, to orange, to scarlet shot with rose, to vermilion, a translucent green, thence back into the iridescence. Behind it four others, and the least of them ten feet in diameter, and the largest no less than thirty. They drifted past like bubbles blown from froth of rainbows by pipes in mouths of titans young. Then from the base of one arose a tangle of shimmering strands, long, slender whiplashes that played about and sank slowly again beneath the crimson surface. I gasped, for the fish had been a ganoid, that ancient armored form that was perhaps the most intelligent of all life on our planet during the Devonian era, but which for age upon age had vanished, save for its fossils held in the embrace of the stone that once was their soft bottom beds. And the half-globes were medusie, jellyfish, but of a size, luminosity, and color unheard of. Now Lakla cupped her mouth with pink palms and sent a clarion note ringing out. The ledge on which we stood continued a few hundred feet before us, falling abruptly, though from no great height to the crimson sea. At right and left it extended in a long semi-circle. Turning to the right, when she had sent her call, I saw rising a mile or more away, veiled lightly by the haze a rainbow, a gigantic prismatic arch, flattened, I thought, by some quality of the strange atmosphere. It sprang from the ruddy strand, leaped the crimson tide, and dropped three miles away upon a precipitous jagged upthrust of rock frowning black from the lacquered depths. And surmounting a higher ledge beyond this upthrust, a huge dome of dull gold, cyclopean, striking eyes and mind with something unhumanly alien, baffling. Sending the mind groping, as though across the deserts of space, from some far-flung star, should fall upon us linked sounds, coherent certainly, meaningful surely, vaguely familiar, yet never to be translated into any symbol or thought of our own particular planet. The sea of crimson lacquer with its floating moons of luminous color, this bow of prismed stone leaping to the weird aisle crowned by the anomalous Ariate excrements, the half-human betracheans, the elf land through which we had passed with all its hidden wonders and terrors. I felt the foundations of my cherished knowledge shaking. Was this all a dream? Was this body of mine lying somewhere, fighting a fevered death, and all these but images floating through the breaking chambers of my brain? My knees shook. Involuntarily I groaned. Lakla turned, looked at me anxiously, slipped a soft arm behind me, held me till the vertigo passed. Patience, she said. The bearers come. Soon you shall rest. I looked. Down toward us, from the bow's end, were leaping swiftly another score of the frogmen. Some bore litters, high, handled, not unlike palanquines. As guard, Olaf stood beside me, eyes burning, pointing to the arch. Be frost-bridge, sharp as sword-edge, over which souls go to Valhalla. And she, she is a Valkyr, a sword-maiden, yeah! I gripped the Norseman's hand. It was hot, and a pang of remorse shot through me. If this place had so shaken me, how must it have shaken Olaf? It was with relief that I watched him, at Lakla's gentle command, drop into one of the litters and lie back, eyes closed, as two of the monsters raised its yoke to their scaled shoulders. Nor was it without further relief that I myself lay back on the soft, velvety cushions of another. The cavalcade began to move. Lakla had ordered O'Keefe place beside her, and she sat, knees crossed, orient fashion, leaning over the pale head on her lap, the white, tapering fingers, straying fondly through his hair. Presently I saw her reach up, slowly unwind the coronal of her tresses, shake them loose and let them fall like a veil over her and him. Her head bent low. I heard a soft sobbing. I turned away my gaze, lorn enough in my own heart, God knew. The arch was closer, and in my awe I forgot for the moment Larry and odd else, for this was no rainbow, no thing born of light and mist, no bifrost bridge of myth, no. It was a flying arch of stone, stained with flares of Tyrion purples, of royal scarlets, of blues dark as the gulf streams ribbon, sapphire soft as midday May skies, splashes of chromes and greens, a pallet of giantry, a bridge of wizardry. A hundred, nay, a thousand times greater than that of Utah, which the Navajo call nonagoshe, and worship as well they may as a God, and which is itself a rainbow in eternal rock. It sprang from the ledge and winged its prodigious length in one low arc over the sea's crimson breast, as though in some ancient paroxysm of earth it had been hurled molten, crystallizing into that stupendous span and still flaming with the fires that had molded it. Closer we came and closer, while I watched spellbound. Now we were at its head, and the litter bearer swept upon it. All of five hundred feet wide it was, surface smooth as a city road, sides low walled, curving inward, as though in the jetting out of its making the edges of the plastic rock had curled. On and on we sped. The high, thrusting precipices upon which the bridge's far end rested frowned close. The enigmatic, dully shining dome loomed ever greater. Now we had reached that end. We were passing over a smooth plaza whose level floor was enclosed, say for a rift in front of us, by the fanged tops of the black cliffs. From this rift stretched another span, half a mile long perhaps, widening at its center into a broad platform, continuing straight to two massive gates set within the face of the second cliff wall like panels, and of the same dull gold as the dome rising high beyond. And this smaller arch leaped a pit, an abyss of which the outer precipices were the rim holding back from the pit the red flood. We were rapidly approaching, now upon the platform. My barriers were striding closely along the side. I leaned far out. A giddiness seized me. I gazed down into depth upon vertiginous depth, an abyss indeed, an abyss dropping to world's base, like that in which the Babylonians believed writhed Talat, the serpent mother of chaos, a pit that struck down into earth's heart itself. Now what was that, distance upon unfathomable distance below, a stupendous glowing like the green fire of life itself? What was it like? I had it. It was like the corona of the sun in eclipse, that burgeoning that makes of our luminary when moon veils it an incredible blossoming of splendors in the black heavens. And, strangely, strangely, it was like the dweller's beauty when with its dazzling spirals and writhings it raced amid its storm of crystal bell-sounds. The abyss was behind us. We had paused at the golden portals. They swung inward. A wide corridor filled with soft light was before us, and on its threshold stood bizarre yellow gems gleaming, huge muzzle wide in what was evidently meant for a smile of welcome, the woman frog of the moon-poole wall. Lakla raised her head, swept back the silk intent of her hair, and gazed at me with eyes misty from weeping. The frog woman crept to her side, gazed down upon Larry. Spoke, to the golden girl, in a swift stream of the sonorous, reverberant monosyllables. And Lakla answered her in kind. The webbed digits swept over O'Keeffe's face, felt at his heart. She shook her head and moved ahead of us up the passage. Still born in the litters we went on, winding, ascending, until at last they were set down in a great hall, carpeted with soft, fragrant rushes, and into which from high narrow slits streamed the crimson light from without. I jumped over to Larry. There had been no change in his condition. Still, the terrifying limpness, the slow, infrequent pulsation. Rador and Olaf, and the fever now seemed to be gone from him, came and stood beside me, silent. I go to the three, said Lakla. Wait you here. She passed through a curtening. Then, as swiftly as she had gone, she returned through the hangings, tresses braided, a swathing of golden gauze about her. Rador, she said, bring you Larry, for into your heart the silent ones would look. And fear nothing, she added, at the green dwarfs disconcerted, almost fearful start. Rador bowed, was thrust aside by Olaf. No, said the Norseman, I will carry him. He lifted Larry like a child against his broad breast. The dwarf glanced quickly at Lakla. She nodded. Come, she commanded, and held aside the folds. Of that journey I have few memories. I only know that we went through corridor upon corridor, successions of vast halls and chambers, some carpeted with the rushes, others with rugs into which the feet sank as into deep, soft meadows, spaces illumined by the rubrous light, and spaces in which softer lights held sway. We paused before a slab of the same crimson stone as that the green dwarf had called the portal, and upon its polished surface weaved the same unnameable symbols. The golden girl pressed upon its side, it slipped softly back, a torrent of opalescence gushed out of the opening, and, as one in a dream, I entered. We were, I knew, just under the dome. But for the moment, caught in the flood of radiance, I could see nothing. It was like being held within a fire-opal. So brilliant, so flashing, was it. I closed my eyes, opened them. The lambency cascaded from the vast curves of the globular walls. In front of me was a long, narrow opening in them, through which, far away, I could see the end of the wizard's bridge and the ledged mouth of the cavern through which we had come. Against the light from within beat the crimson light from without, and was checked as though by a barrier. I felt Lakla's touch turned. A hundred paces away was a deus, its rim raised a yard above the floor. From the edge of this rim streamed upward a steady, coruscating mist of the opalescence, veined even as was that of the dweller's shining core, and shot with milky shadows like curdled moonlight. Up it stretched like a wall. Over it, from it, down upon me, gazed three faces, two clearly male, one a woman's. At the first I thought them statues, and then the eyes of them gave the lie to me, for the eyes were alive, terribly, and if I could admit the word, supernaturally alive. They were thrice the size of the human eye, and triangular, the apex of the angle upward, black as jet, pupillous, filled with tiny, leaping red flames. Over them were foreheads, not as ours, high, and broad, and visor'd. Their sides drawn forward into a vertical ridge, a prominence, an upright wedge, somewhat like the visor'd heads of a few of the great lizards, and the heads, long, narrowing at the back, were fully twice the size of mankind's. Upon the brows were caps, and with a fearful certainty I knew that they were not caps, long, thick strands of gleaming yellow, feathered scales thin as sequins, sharp, curving noses like the beaks of the giant condors, mouths thin, austere, long, powerful, pointed chins, the flesh of the faces, white as the whitest marble, and breathing up to them, covering all their bodies, the shimmering, curdled, misty fires of opalescence. Olaf stood rigid, my own heart leaped wildly. What, what were these beings? I forced myself to look again, and from their gaze streamed a current of reassurance, of goodwill, nay, of intense spiritual strength. I saw that they were not fierce, not ruthless, not inhuman, despite their strangeness. No, they were kindly, in some unmistakable way, benign and sorrowful, so sorrowful. I straightened, gazed back at them fearlessly. Olaf drew a deep breath, gazed steadily too. The hardness, the despair, wiped from his face. Now Lakla drew closer to the deus. The three pairs of eyes searched hers, the woman's, with an ineffable tenderness. Some message seemed to pass between the three and the golden girl. She bowed low, turned to the Norseman. Place Larry there, she said softly, there at the feet of the silent ones. She pointed into the radiant mist. Olaf started, hesitated, stared from Lakla to the three, searched for a moment their eyes, and something like a smile drifted through them. He stepped forward, lifted O'Keefe, set him squarely within the covering light. It wavered, rolled upward, swirled about the body, steadied again, and within it there was no sign of Larry. Again the mist wavered, shook, and seemed to climb higher, hiding the chins, the beaked noses, the brows of that incredible trinity. But before it ceased to climb, I thought the yellow feathered heads bent, sensed a movement, as though they lifted something. The mist fell, the eyes gleamed out again, inscrutable. And groping out of the radiance, pausing at the verge of the deus, leaping down from it, came Larry, laughing, filled with life, blinking as one who draws from darkness into sunshine. He saw Lakla sprang to her, gripped her in his arms. Lakla, he cried, Mavernine! She slipped from his embrace, blushing, glancing at the three shyly, half fearfully. And again I saw the tenderness creep into the inky, flame-shot orbs of the woman being, and a tenderness in the others too, as though they regarded some well-beloved child. You lay in the arms of death, Larry, she said, and the silent ones drew you from him. Do homage to the silent ones, Larry, for they are good and they are mighty. She turned his head with one of the long white hands, and he looked into the faces of the three. Looked long, was shaken, even as had been Olaf and myself, was swept by that same wave of power, and of, of, what can I call it, holiness that streamed from them. Then for the first time I saw real awe mount into his face. Another moment he stared, and dropped upon one knee, and bowed his head before them, as would a worshipper before the shrine of his saint. And, I am not ashamed to tell it, I joined him, and with us knelt Lakla and Olaf and Rador. The mist of fiery opal swirled up about the three, hid them, and with a long, deep, joyous sigh Lakla took Larry's hand, drew him to his feet, and silently we followed them out of that hall of wonder. But why, in going, did the thought come to me that, from where the three sat thrown, they ever watched the cavern-mouth that was the door into their abode, and looked down ever into the unfathomable depth in which glowed and pulsed that mystic flower, colossal, awesome, of green flame that had seemed to me fire of life itself. Chapter 26 The Wooing of Lakla I had slept soundly and dreamlessly. I wakened quietly in the great chamber into which Rador had ushered O'Keefe and myself after that culminating experience of crowded, nerve-wracking hours the facing of the three. Now, lying gazing upward at the high vaulted ceiling, I heard Larry's voice. They look like birds. Evidently he was thinking of the three. A silence, then. Yes, they look like birds, and they look, and it's meaning no disrespect to them, I am at all. They look like lizards. And another silence. They look like some sort of gods, and by the good sword arm of Brian Boru they look human, too. And it's none of them they are, either. So what, what the—what the Saint at Saint Bridget are they? Another short silence, and then, in a tone of odd and absolute conviction. That's it, sure. That's what they are. It all hangs in. They couldn't be anything else. He gave a whoop, a pillow shot over, and caught me across the head. Wake up, shouted Larry. Wake up, you seething cauldron of fossilized superstitions. Wake up, you bogey-haunted man of scientific unwisdom. Under pillow and insults I bounced to my feet, filled for a moment with quite real wrath. He lay back, roaring with laughter, and my anger was swept away. Doc, he said, very seriously after this, I know who the three are. Yes, I queried, with studied sarcasm. Yes, he mimicked. Yes, yeah, yeah. He paused under the menace of my look, grinned. Yes, I know, he continued. There of the Tatua de, the old ones, the great people of Ireland. That's who they are. I knew, of course, of the Tuatha de Danan, the tribes of the God Danu, the half-legendary, half-historical clan who found their home in Aran some four thousand years before the Christian era, and who have left so deep an impress upon the Celtic mind and its myths. Yes, said Larry again, the Tuatha de, the ancient ones, who had spells that could compel Mananan, who is the spirit of all the seas and Cator, who is the God of all green living things, and even Jesus, the unseen God, whose pulse is the pulse of all the firmament. Yes, in Orchill too, who sits within the earth and weaves with the shuttle of mystery and her three looms of birth and life and death, even Orchill would weave as they commanded. He was silent. Then... They are of them, the mighty ones. Why else would I have bent my knee to them as I would have to the spirit of my dead mother? Why else would Lacla, whose gold-brown hair is the hair of Elid the Fair, whose mouth is the sweet mouth of Deirdre, and whose soul, walked with mine, ages are gone, among the fragrant green myrtle of Aran, serve them? He whispered, eyes full of dream. Have you any idea how they got here? I asked, not unreasonably. I haven't thought about that, he replied, somewhat testily. But at once, me excellent man of wisdom, a number occurred to me. One of them is that this little party of three might have stopped here on their way to Ireland, and for good reasons of their own decided to stay a while. And another is that they might have come here afterward, haven't got wind of what those rats out there were contemplating, and have stayed on the job till the time was ripe to save Ireland from them. The rest of the world too, of course, he added magnanimously. But Ireland in particular. And do any of those reasons appeal to you? I shook my head. Well, what do you think? he asked, wearily. I think, I said cautiously, that we face an evolution of highly intelligent beings from ancestral sources radically removed from those through which mankind ascended. These half-human, highly developed Petracians, they call the Acca, prove that evolution in these caverned spaces has certainly pursued one different path than on earth. The Englishman, Wells, wrote an imaginative and very entertaining book concerning an invasion of earth by Martians, and he made his Martians enormously specialized cuttlefish. There was nothing inherently improbable in Wells' choice. Man is the ruling animal of earth today solely by reason of a series of accidents. Under another series, spiders, or ants, or even elephants, could have become the dominant race. I think, I said even more cautiously, that the race to which the three belong never appeared on earth's surface, that their development took place here, unhindered through eons. And if this be true, the structure of their brains, and therefore all their reactions, must be different from ours. Hence their knowledge and command of energies unfamiliar to us, and hence also the question whether they may not have an entirely different sense of values of justice, and that is rather terrifying, I concluded. Larry shook his head. That last sort of noxier argument, Doc, he said. They had sense of justice enough to help me out, and certainly they know love, for I saw the way they looked at Lakla, and sorrow, for there was no mistaking that in their faces. No, he went on. I hold to my own idea. They're of the old people. The little leprechaun knew his way here, and I'll bet it was they who sent the word. And if the old Keith Banshee comes here, which saved the mark, I'll bet she'll drop in on the signet ones for a social visit before she and her clan get busy. Well, it'll make her feel great, more at home, the good old buddy. No, Doc, no, he concluded. I'm right. It all fits in too well to be wrong. I made a last despairing attempt. Is there anything anywhere in Ireland that would indicate that the Tuatha day ever looked like the three? I asked, and again I had spoken most unfortunately. Is there, he shouted, is there, by the Kiltakarmak makarmak, I'm glad you reminded me. It was worrying me a little myself. There was Dagda, who could put on the head of a great bore, and the body of a giant fish, and cleave the waves and tear to pieces the bearlands of anyone who came against Aaron. And there was Rinne. How many more of the metamorphoses of the old people I might have heard, I do not know, for the curtains parted and in Wachterador. You have rested well, he smiled. I can see. The handmaiden bade me call you. You are to eat with her in the garden. Down long corridors we trod, and out upon a garden terrace, as beautiful as any of those of Ularis City. Bowered, blossoming, fragrant, set high upon the cliffs beside the domed castle. A table, as of milky jade, was spread at one corner, but the golden girl was not there. A little path ran on and up, hemmed in by the massive verger. I looked at it longingly. Rador saw the glance, interpreted it, and led me up the stepped sharp slope into a rock embrasure. Here I was above the foliage, and everywhere the view was clear. Below me stretched the incredible bridge, with the frog-people hurrying back and forth upon it. A pinnacle at my side hid the abyss. My eyes followed the cavern ledge. Above it the rock rose bare, but at the ends of the semi-circuiter strand a luxuriant vegetation began, stretching from the crimson shores back into far distances. Of browns and reds and yellows, like an autumn forest was the foliage, with here and there patches of dark green, as of conifers. Five miles or more on each side the forest swept, and then were lost to sight in the haze. I turned and faced an immensity of crimson waters, unbroken, a true sea if ever there was one. A breeze blew, the first real wind I had encountered in the hidden places. Under it the surface that had been as molten lacquer rippled and dimpled. Little waves broke with a spray of rose pearls and rubies. The giant medouzi drifted stately, luminous, kaleidoscopic, elfin moons. Far down, peeping around a jutting tower of the cliff, I saw dipping with the motion of the waves a floating garden. The flowers too were luminous, indeed sparkling, gleaming brilliance of scarlet and vermilions lighter than the flood in which they lay. Mauves and odd shades of reddish blue. They gleamed and shone like a little lake of jewels. Rador broke in upon my musings. Lakla comes, let us go down. It was a shy Lakla who came slowly around the end of the path, and blushing furiously held her hands out to Larry. And the Irishman took them, placed them over his heart, kissed them with a tenderness that had been lacking in the half-mocking, half-fierce caresses he had given the priestess. She blushed deeper, holding out the tapering fingers, then pressed them to her own heart. I like the touch of your lips, Larry, she whispered. They warm me here, she pressed her heart again, and they send little sparkles of light through me. Her brows tilted perplexedly, accenting the nuance of Diablerie, delicate and fascinating that they cast upon the flower face. Do you? whispered the O'Keefe fervently. Do you, Lakla? He bent toward her. She caught the amused glance of Rador, do herself aside, half-hottily. Rador, she said, is it not time that you and the strong one, Olaf, were setting forth? Truly it is, handmaiden, he answered respectfully enough, yet with a current of laughter under his words. But as you know, the strong one, Olaf, wished to see his friends here before we were gone, and he comes even now, he added, glancing down the pathway, along which came striding the Norseman. As he faced us, I saw that a transformation had been wrought in him. Gone was the pitiful seeking, and gone, too, the just as pitiful hope. The set face softened as he looked at the golden girl and bowed low to her. He thrust a hand to O'Keefe and to me. There is to be battle, he said. I go with Rador to call the armies of these frog-people. As for me, Lakla has spoken. There is no hope for—for—my helmet in life. But there is hope that we destroy the shining devil and give mine helm apiece. And with that I am well content, ya, well content. He gripped our hands again. We will fight, he muttered, ya, and I will have vengeance. The sternness returned, and with a salute Rador and he were gone. Two great tears rolled from the golden eyes of Lakla. Not even the silent ones can heal those the shining one has taken, she said. He asked me, and it was better that I tell him. It is part of the three's punishment, but of that you will soon learn, she went on hurriedly. Ask me no questions now of the silent ones. I thought it better for Olaf to go with Rador, to busy himself, to give his mind other than sorrow upon which to feed. Up the path came five of the frog-women, bearing platters and ewers. Their bracelets and anklets of jewels were tinkling. Their middles covered with short curdles of woven cloth, studded with the sparkling ornaments. And here let me say that, if I have given the impression that the aca were simply magnified frogs, I regret it. Frog-like they are, and hence my phrase for them, but as unlike the frog, as we know it, as man is unlike the chimpanzee. Springing, I hazard from the stegosophalia, the ancestor of the frogs, these patracians followed a different line of evolution, and acquired the upright position, just as man did his from the four-footed folk. The great staring eyes, the shape of the muzzle were frog-like, but the highly developed brain had set upon the head and shape of it vital differences. The forehead, for instance, was not low, flat, and retreating. Its frontal arch was well-defined. The head was, in a sense, shapely, and with the females the great horny carapace that stood over it like a fantastic helmet was much modified, as were the spurs that were so formidable in the male. Coloration was different also. The torso was upright. The legs a little bent, giving them their crouching gait. But I wander from my subject. They set their burdens down. Larry looked at them with interest. Yes, surely have those things well-trained, Lacla, he said. Things, the handmaiden arose, eyes flashing with indignation. You call my Aka things? Well, said Larry, a bit taken aback, what do you call them? My Aka are a people, she retorted. As much a people as your race or mine. They are good and loyal, and they have speech and arts, and they slay not, save for food or to protect themselves. And I think them beautiful, Larry, beautiful. She stamped her foot. And you call them things. Beautiful, these. Yet, after all, they were in their grotesque fashion. And to Lacla, surrounded by them from babyhood, they were not strange at all. Why shouldn't she think them beautiful? The same thought must have struck O'Keefe, for he flushed guiltily. I think them beautiful, too, Lacla, he said remorsefully. It's my not knowing your tongue too well that traps me. Truly, I think them beautiful. I'd tell them so if I knew their talk. Lacla dimpled, laughed, spoke to the attendants in that strange speech that was unquestionably a language. They bridled, looked at O'Keefe with fantastic coquetry, cracked and boomed softly among themselves. They say they like you better than the men of Muria, laughed Lacla. Did I ever think I'd be swapping compliments with Lady Frogs? He murmured to me. Baccapleri, keep your eyes on the captive Irish princess. He muttered to himself. Rador goes to meet one of the Ladala who is slipping through with news, said the golden girl, as we addressed ourselves to the food. Then, with knock, he and Olaf go to muster the acca, for there will be a battle, and we must prepare. Knock, she added, is he who went before me when you were dancing with Yolara, Larry? She stole a swift mischievous glance at him. He is headman of all the acca. Just what forces can we muster against them when they come, darlin', said Larry. Darlin', the golden girl had caught the caress of the word. What's that? It's a little word that means Lacla, he answered. It does, that is, when I say it. When you say it, then it means Larry. I like that word, mused Lacla. You could even say Larry Darlin', suggested O'Keefe. Larry Darlin', said Lacla. When they come, we shall have first of all my acca. Can they fight, mavernine? interrupted Larry. Can they fight, my acca? again her eyes flashed. They will fight to the last of them, with the spears that give the swift rotting, covered as they are, with the jelly of those sadhu there. She pointed through a rift in the foliage, across which, on the surface of the sea, was floating one of the moon globes, and now I know why Rador had warned Larry against to plunge there. With spears and clubs, and with teeth and nails and spurs, they are a strong and brave people, Larry Darlin', and though they hurl the cat at them, it is slow to work upon them, and they slay, even while they are passing into the nothingness. And have we none of the keth, he asked? No, she shook her head. None of their weapons have we here, although it was, it was the ancient ones who shaped them. But the three are of the ancient ones, I cried. Surely they can tell. No, she said slowly. No, there is something you must know. And soon, and then the silent ones say you will understand. You especially, Goodwin, who worship wisdom. Then, said Larry, we have the akka, and we have the four men of us, and among us three guns and about a hundred cartridges, and, and, the power of the three. But what about the shining one, fireworks? I do not know. Again the indecision that had been in her eyes when Yolara had launched her defiance crept back. The shining one is strong, and he has his slaves. Well, we'd better get busy, good and quick, the old kief's voice rang. But Lakla, for some reason of her own, would pursue the matter no further. The trouble fled from her eyes. They danced. Larry, darling, she murmured, I like the touch of your lips. You do, he whispered, all thought flying of anything but the beautiful, provocative face so close to his. Then, Akushla, you're going to get acquainted with them. Turn your head, doc, he said. And I turned it. There was quite a long silence, broken by an interesting soft outburst of gentle boomings from the serving frogmaids. I stole a glance behind me. Lakla's head lay on the Irishman's shoulder, the golden eyes, misty sun-pools of love and adoration. And the Yolkief, a new look of power and strength upon his clear-cut features, was gazing down into them with that look which rises only from the heart touched for the first time with that true, all-powerful love, which is the pulse of the universe itself, the real music of the spheres of which Plato dreamed, the love that is stronger than death itself, immortal as the high gods and the true soul of all that mystery we call life. Then Lakla raised her hands, pressed down Larry's head, kissed him between the eyes, drew herself with a trembling little laugh from his embrace. The future misses Larry O'Keefe, Godwin, said Larry to me a little unsteadily. I took their hands, and Lakla kissed me. She turned to the booming, smiling frogmaids, gave them some command, for they filed away down the path. Suddenly I felt, well, a little superfluous. If you don't mind, I said, I think I'll go up the path there again and look about. But they were so engrossed with each other that they did not even hear me, so I walked away, up to the embrasure where Rador had taken me. The movement of the Batrakians over the bridge had ceased. Dimly, at the far end, I could see the cluster of the garrison. My thoughts flew back to Lakla and to Larry. What was to be the end? If we won, if we were able to pass from this place, could she live in our world? A product of these caverns with their atmosphere and light that seemed in some subtle way to be both food and drink, how would she react to the unfamiliar foods and air and light of the outer earth? Further, here, so far as I was able to discover, there were no malignant bacilli. What immunity could Lakla have then to those microscopic evils without, which only long ages of sickness and death have brought for us a modicum of protection? I began to be oppressed. Surely they had been long enough by themselves. I went down the path. I heard Larry. It's a green land, mavernin, and the sea rocks and dimples around it, blue as the heavens, green as the isle itself, and foam horses toss their white mains, and the great clean winds blow over it, and the sun shines down on it like your eyes, Akushla. Are you a king of Ireland, Larry Darling? Thus Lakla. But enough. At last we turned to go, and around the corner of the path I caught another glimpse of what I have called the Lake of Jewels. I pointed to it. Those are lovely flowers, Lakla, I said. I have never seen anything like them in the place from whence we come. She followed my pointing finger, laughed. Come, she said, let me show you them. She ran down an intersecting way, we following. Came out of it upon a little ledge close to the brink, three feet or more, I suppose, about it. The golden girl's voice rang out in a high-pitched, tremulous, throbbing call. The Lake of Jewels stirred as though a breeze had passed over it, stirred, shook, and then began to move swiftly, a shimmering torrent of shining flowers down upon us. She called again. The movement became more rapid. The gem bloom streamed closer, closer, wavering, shifting, winding at our very feet. Above them hovered a little radiant mist. The golden girl leaned over, called softly, and up from the sparkling mass shot a green vine whose heads were five flowers of flaming ruby. Shot up, flew into her hand, and coiled about the white arm, its quintet of lambit blossoms, regarding us. It was the thing Lakla had called the yekta, that with which he had threatened the priestess, the thing that carried the dreadful death, and the golden girl was handling it like a rose. Larry swore. I looked at the thing more closely. It was a hydroid, a development of that strange animal vegetable that, sometimes almost microscopic, waves in the sea depths like a cluster of flowers, paralyzing its prey with the mysterious force that dwells in its blossom heads. Put it down, Lakla. The distress in O'Keeffe's voice was deep. Lakla laughed mischievously, caught the real fear for her in his eyes, opened her hand, gave another faint call, and back it flew to its fellows. Why, it wouldn't hurt me, Larry, she expostulated. They know me. Put it down, he repeated hoarsely. She sighed, gave another sweet, prolonged call. The lake of gems, rubies and amethysts, mobs and scarlet-tinged blues, wavered and shook even as it had before, and swept swiftly back to that place when she had drawn them. Then, with Larry and Lakla walking ahead, white arm about his brown neck, the O'Keeffe still expostulating, the handmaiden laughing merrily, we passed through her bower to the domed castle. Glancing through a cleft, I caught a sight again of the far end of the bridge, noted among the clustered figures of its garrison, of the frogmen, a movement, a flashing of green fire, like marsh lights on spear-tips. Wondered idly what it was, and then, other thoughts crowding in, followed along, head-bent, behind the pair, who had found, in what was Olaf's hell, their true paradise. Footnote 1 The Aka are vivaporous. The female produces progeny at five-year intervals, never more than two at a time. They are monogamous, like certain of our own Rannidae. Pending my monograph upon what little I had time to learn of their interesting habits and customs, the curious will find instruction and entertainment in Brandus and Schvenniken's Brutfliga der Schwanzlosen Badrachir, page 395, and Lillian V. Sampson's unusual modes of breeding among anyura, American naturalist 34, 1900, W.T.G. Footnote 2 The yekta of the Crimson Sea are as extraordinary developments of hydroid forms as the giant Medusae, of which, of course, they are not two remote cousins. The closest resemblances to them in outer water forms are among the gymnoblastic hydroids, notably clavatella prolifera, a most interesting ambulatory form of six tentacles. Almost every bather in southern waters, northern two, knows the pain that contact with certain jellyfish produces. The yekta's development was prodigious, and, to us, monstrous. Its secretes, in its five heads, an almost incredibly swiftly acting poison, which I suspect, for I had no chance to verify the theory, destroys the entire nervous system to the accompaniment of truly infernal agony, carrying at the same time the illusion that the torment stretches through infinities of time. Both ether and nitrous oxide gas produce in the majority this sensation of time extension, without, of course, the pain symptom. What Lakla called the yekta kiss is, I imagine, about as close to the orthodox idea of hell as can be conceived. The secret of her control over them I had no opportunity of learning in the rush of events that followed. Knowledge of the appalling effects of their touch came, she told me, from those few who had been kissed so lightly that they recovered. Certainly nothing, not even the shining one, was dreaded by the myrians as these were.