Part 10 (1/2)
”Yes--you told us so, dear daughter.”
”They also know that the blood of a brave man who dies in pledge of friends.h.i.+p is a valorous offering to Hesus, and that it might appease him.”
”Yes--you told us so, dear daughter.”
”Finally, my father and mother know that the most acceptable of all offerings to Hesus and most likely to appease him is the innocent blood of a virgin, happy and proud at the thought of offering her blood to Hesus, and of doing so voluntarily--voluntarily--in the hope that that all-powerful G.o.d may deliver our beloved fatherland, this dear and sacred fatherland of our fathers, from foreign oppression!... Thus the innocent blood of a virgin will flow this evening to appease the wrath of Hesus.”
”And her name?” asked Stumpy, ”the name of that virgin who is to deliver us from war!”
Hena looked towards her father and mother with tenderness and serenity and said:
”The virgin who is to die is one of the nine female druids of the Isle of Sen. Her name is Hena. She is the daughter of Margarid and Joel, the brenn of the tribe of Karnak!”
Deep silence fell upon the family of Joel. None, not one present, expected to see Hena travel so soon yonder. None, not one present, neither her father, nor her mother, nor her brothers, nor any of her other relatives, was prepared for the farewells of the sudden journey.
The children joined their little hands and said weeping:
”What!... Leave us so soon?... Our Hena?... Why do you journey away?”
The father and mother looked at each other and sighed.
Margarid said to Hena: ”Joel and Margarid believed that they would have to wait for their dear daughter in those unknown worlds, where we continue to live and where we meet again those whom we have loved here.... But it is to be otherwise. It is Hena who will precede us.”
”And perhaps,” said the brenn, ”our sweet and dear daughter will not long have to wait for us--”
”May her blood, innocent and pure as a lamb's, appease the wrath of Hesus!” added Margarid; ”May we soon be able to follow our dear daughter and inform her that Gaul is delivered from the stranger.”
”And the remembrance of the valiant sacrifice of our daughter shall be kept alive in our race,” said the father; ”so long as the descendants of Joel, the brenn of the tribe of Karnak, shall live they will be proud to number among their ancestors Hena, the virgin of the Isle of Sen.”
The young maid made no answer. Her eyes wandered with sweet avidity from one relative to the other as, at the moment of undertaking a journey, the departing one takes a last look at the beloved beings from whom he is to be separated for a while.
Pointing through the open door at the moon that, now at her fullest, was seen across the evening mist rising large-orbed and ruddy like a burning disk, Stumpy cried:
”Hena!... Hena! The moon is rising above the horizon....”
”You are right, Stumpy; this is the hour,” she said, unwillingly taking her eyes from the faces of her beloved family. An instant later she added:
”Let my father and mother and all the members of my family accompany me to the sacred stones of the forest of Karnak.... The hour of the sacrifice has come.”
Walking between Joel and Margarid, and followed by all the members of the tribe, Hena walked serenely to the forest of Karnak.
CHAPTER IX.
THE FOREST OF KARNAK.
The call for a.s.sembling that was issued to the tribes at noon, had run from mouth to mouth, from village to village, from town to town. It was heard all over Breton Gaul. Towards evening the tribes proceeded en ma.s.se--men, women and children--to the forest of Karnak, the same as Joel and his family.
The moon, at her fullest on that night, shone radiant amid the stars in the firmament. After having marched through the dark and the lighted spots of the forest, the a.s.sembling mult.i.tude finally arrived at the sh.o.r.es of the sea. The sacred stones of Karnak rose there in nine long avenues. They are sacred stones! They are the gigantic pillars of a temple that has the sky for its vault.