Part 5 (1/2)
”And what have you seen, Shauard?”
”Strange sight, Khania, my niece But-men awake from swoons”
”Aye,” she answered, ”so while this one sleeps, bear hie, and the lord yonder needs more space and untainted air”
The Guardian, whoician, held a laht it was easy to see his face, which I watched out of the corner of e expression, oneI had misobed me of this old man, whose cast of countenance was vindictive as it was able; noas afraid of hi
”I think,” she answered slowly, ”to one that is healthful, where he will recover The h in explanation, ” the word froerous But why do you ask?”
He shrugged his shoulders
”I tell you I heard the death-hounds bay, that is all Yes, with you I think that he has wisdom, and the bee which seeks honey should suck the flower-before it fades! Also, as you say, there are couess theirto the door he blew upon his whistle, and instantly I heard the feet of his servants upon the stairs He gave theh they lifted the es and past some stairs into another chae, where they placed me upon a bed
The Guardian watched me awhile to see that I did not wake Next he stretched out his hand and felt my heart and pulse; an examination the results of which seemed to puzzle him, for he uttered a little exclamation and shook his head After this he left the roo still very weak, I fell asleep in earnest
When I awoke it was broad daylight My mind was clear and I felt better than I had done for ns by which I knew that the fever had left h road to recovery Now I reht and was able to weigh the theer
I had seen and heard too uessed that I had seen and heard Indeed, had it not been for my hints about the Symbol of Life and the Mount of Flae by my artifice, I felt sure that she would have ordered the old Guardian or Shaman to do me to death in this way or the other; sure also that he would not have hesitated to obey her I had been spared partly because, for some unknown reason, she was afraid to kill h the ”death-hounds had bayed,” whatever that ht mean Well, up to the present I was safe, and for the rest I must take my chance Moreover it was necessary to be cautious, and, if need were, to feign ignorance So, dis thethe scene which I had witnessed and what ht be its purport
Was our quest at an end? Was this woman Ayesha? Leo had so dreamed, but he was still delirious, therefore here was little on which to lean What seemed more to the point was that she herself evidently appeared to think that there existed some tie between her and this sick man Why had she embraced him? I was sure that she could be no wanton, nor indeed would any woer who hung between life and death What she had done was done because irresistible ie, or at least of e was imperfect and the memories were undefined Who save Ayesha could have known anything of Leo in the past? None who lived upon the earth to-day
And yet, why not, if what Kou-en the abbot and tens of millions of his felloorshi+ppers believed were true? If the souls of hus were in fact strictly limited in number, and became the tenants of an endless succession of physical bodies which they change froarments, why should not others have known hihter of the Pharaohs who ”caused hih love to break the vows that he had vowed” knew a certain Kallikrates, a priest of ”Isis whom the Gods cherish and the deic
Oh! now a light seeht What if Amenartas and this Khania, this woman with royalty staic of my own people that I have” of which she wrote upon the Sherd, enable her to pierce the darkness of the Past and recognize the priest who him out of the very hand of the Goddess? What if it were not Ayesha, but Amenartas re-incarnate who ruled this hidden land and once h his vows? If so, knowing the evil that must come, I shook even at its shadow The truth must be learned, but how?
Whilst I wondered the door opened, and the sardonic, inscrutable-old-faced ician, and who called the Khania, niece, entered and stood before me
CHAPTER VII
THE FIRST ORDEAL
The shaman advanced to my side and asked me courteously how I fared
I answered, ”Better Far better, oh, my host-but how are you named?”
”Simbri,” he answered, ”and, as I told you by the water, my title is Hereditary Guardian of the Gate By profession I am the royal Physician in this land”
”Did you say physician or ht the word He gave me a curious look
”I said physician, and it is well for you and your companion that I have some skill in my art Otherwise I think, perhaps, you would not have been alive to-day, O uest-but how are you nauest, Holly”
”Had it not been for the foresight that brought you and the lady Khania to the edge of yonder darksome river, certainly we should not have been alive, venerable Siic in such a lonely place That is why I thought you h it is true that youin those waters”
”Certainly I was fishi+ng, stranger Holly-forby chance, host Siuest Holly My trade of physician includes the study of future events, for I a been warned of your co quite recently, I awaited your arrival”
”Indeed, that is strange, ician rave bow; ”but tell me, if you will, how did you find your way to a land whither visitors do not wander?”
”Oh!” I answered, ”perhaps we are but travellers, or perhaps we also have studied-medicine”
”I think that you must have studied it deeply, since otherwise you would not have lived to cross those mountains in search of-nohat did you seek? Your companion, I think, spoke of a queen-yonder, on the banks of the torrent”
”Did he? Did he, indeed? Well, that is strange since he see lady, na into the stream and saved us, reat one, for in our land Khania h how, friend Holly, a man who has lain senseless can have learned this, I do not know Nor do I kno you coue you talk is very ancient, and as it chances in my own country it has been h it is still spoken in the world, how it reached these mountains I cannot say”
”I will tell you,” he answered ”Many generations ago a great conqueror born of the nation that spoke this tongue fought his way through the country to the south of us He was driven back, but a general of his of another race advanced and crossed thewith hie and his oorshi+p Here he established his dynasty, and here it reed in with deserts and with pathless mountain snoe hold no converse with the outer world”
”Yes, I know so of that story; the conqueror was named Alexander, was he not?” I asked
”He was so naeneral was Rassen, a native of a country called Egypt, or so our records tell us His descendants hold the throne to this day, and the Khania is of his blood”
”Was the Goddess whom he worshi+pped called Isis?”
”Nay,” he answered, ”she was called Hes”
”Which,” I interrupted, ”is but another title for Isis Tell me, is her worshi+p continued here? I ask because it is now dead in Egypt, which was its home”
”There is a temple on the Mountain yonder,” he replied indifferently, ”and in it are priests and priestesses who practise some ancient cult But the real God of this people now, as long before the day of Rassen their conqueror, is the fire that dwells in this same Mountain, which from time to time breaks out and slays them”
”And does a Goddess dwell in the fire?” I asked
Again he searched er Holly, I know nothing of any Goddess That Mountain is sacred, and to seek to learn its secrets is to die Why do you ask such questions?”
”Only because I a the symbol of Life upon yonder peak, came hither to study yours, of which indeed a tradition still re the learned”
”Then abandon that study, friend Holly, for the road to it runs through the paws of the death-hounds, and the spears of savages Nor indeed is there anything to learn”