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Updated: September 17, 2025
"Friend Oros a good title for one who dwells upon the Mountain all we ask is food and shelter, and to be led swiftly into the presence of her whom you name Mother, that Oracle whose wisdom we have travelled far to seek." He bowed and answered: "The food and shelter are prepared and to-morrow, when you have rested, I am commanded to conduct you whither you desire to be.
Think you then that we will turn cowards now? Nay, we march on to fulfil our destinies." At these words Oros showed neither curiosity nor surprise; it was as though I told him only what he knew. "Good," he replied, smiling, and with a courteous bow of his shaven head, "within an hour you shall march on to fulfil your destinies.
He added that they ran to the side of the Mountain and had windows that opened on to gardens and let in the light and air. In this hall six priests were waiting, each of whom carried a bundle of torches beneath his arm and held in his hand a lighted lamp. "Our road runs through the dark," said Oros, "though were it day we might climb the outer snows, but this at night it is dangerous to do."
Should the Khania Atene attempt to detain them against their will, then raise the Tribes upon her in the name of the Hesea; depose her from her seat, conquer her land and hold it. Hear and obey." "Mother, we hear and we will obey," answered Oros and Papave as with a single voice.
I think that by an afterthought, Ayesha and Oros tried to restore him, tried without result, for here her powers were of no avail. Indeed my conviction is that although some lingering life still kept him on his feet, Leo had really died at the moment of her embrace, since when I looked at him before he fell, his face was that of a dead man.
Whilst I was still indulging myself in these reflections and hoping that Ayesha would not take the trouble to read them in my mind, I became aware that Oros was bowing to the earth before her. "Thy business, priest?" she asked sharply; for when she was with Leo Ayesha did not like to be disturbed. "Hes, the spies are returned." "Why didst thou send them out?" she asked indifferently.
I bid thee cease, and tell me how did death find this lord of thine?" "Ask those wanderers yonder, that were his guests, for his blood is on their heads and cries for vengeance at thy hands." "I killed him," said Leo, "to save my own life. He tried to hunt us down with his dogs, and there are the marks of them," and he pointed to my arm. "The priest Oros knows, for he dressed the hurts."
We could hear the distant tinkle of the sistrum bells, the only sound in all that place, yes, and see her lips move, though no whisper reached us from them. Surely spirits were worshipping her! We gripped each other. We shrank back and found the door. It gave to our push. Now we were in the passages again, and now we had reached our room. At its entrance Oros was standing as we had left him.
When Oros had departed she turned to us and said "That tale of mine of long ago was well fitted to this hour, for as Amenartas prophesied of ill, so does Atene prophesy of ill, and Amenartas and Atene are one. Well, let the spear fall, if fall it must, and I will not flinch from it who know that I shall surely triumph at the last.
The little light that always shone upon Ayesha's brow; the wide-set, maddening eyes which were filled sometimes with the fire of the stars and sometimes with the blue darkness of the heavens wherein they float; the curved lips, so wistful yet so proud; the tresses fine as glossy silk that still spread and rippled as though with a separate life; the general air, not so much of majesty as of some secret power hard to be restrained, which strove in that delicate body and proclaimed its presence to the most careless; that flame of the soul within whereof Oros had spoken, shining now through no "vile vessel," but in a vase of alabaster and of pearl none of these things and qualities were altogether human.
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