"When the High Priestess Is the King's mistress Then fall Al- Kyris!"
These foolish doggerel lines! ... why did they suggest themselves? ... they meant nothing. The question did not concern Al-Kyris at all,--let the city stand or fall as it list, who cared, so long as Sah-luma escaped injury! Such, at least, was the tenor of Theos's thoughts, as he rapidly began to calculate certain contingencies that now seemed likely to occur. If, for instance, the King were made aware of Sah-luma's intrigue with Lysia, would not his rage and jealousy exceed all bounds? ... and if, on the other hand, Sah-luma were convinced of the King's passion for the same fatally fair traitress, would not his wrath and injured self-love overbear all loyalty and prudence?
And between the two powerful rivals who thus by stealth enjoyed her capricious favors, what would Lysia's own decision be?--Like a loud hissing in his ears, he heard again the murderous command,--a command which was half a menace: "KILL SAH-LUMA!"
Faint shudders as of icy cold ran through him,--he nerved himself to meet some deadly evil, though he could not guess what that evil might be,--he was willing to throw away all the past that haunted him, and cut off all hope of a future, provided he could only baffle the snares of the pitiless beauty to whom the torture of men was an evident joy, and rescue his beloved and gifted friend from her perilous attraction! Making a strong effort to master the inward conflict of fear and pain that tormented him, he turned his attention anew to the gorgeous ceremony that was going on, . . the march of the priests had come to an abrupt end. They stood now on each side of the Shrine, divided in groups of equal numbers, tossing their flambeaux around and above them to the measured ringing of bells. At every upward wave of these flaring torches, a tongue of fire leaped aloft, to instantly break and descend in a sparkling shower of gold,--the effect of this was wonderful in the extreme, as by the dexterous way in which the flames were flung forth, it appeared to the spectator's eyes as though a luminous Snake were twisting and coiling itself to and fro in mid-air.
All loud music ceased, . . the multitude calmed down by degrees and left off their delirious cries of frenzy or rapture, . . there was nothing heard but a monotonous chanting in undertone, of which not a syllable was distinctly intelligible. Then from out a dark portal unperceived in the shadowed gloom of a curtained niche, there advanced a procession of young girls,--fifty in all, clad in pure white and closely veiled.