The Metal Monster Part 9

At the left and right the k.n.o.bbed arms, now fully fifty feet in length, writhed, twisted, straightened; flexing themselves in grotesque imitation of a boxer. And at the end of each of the six arms the spheres were cl.u.s.tered thick, studded with the pyramids--again in gigantic, awful, parody of the spiked gloves of those ancient gladiators who fought for imperial Nero.

For an instant it stood here, preening, testing itself like an athlete--a chimera, amorphous yet weirdly symmetric--under the darkening sky, in the green of the hollow, the armored hosts frozen before it--

And then--it struck!

Out flashed two of the arms, with a glancing motion, with appalling force. They sliced into the close-packed forward ranks of the armored men; cut out of them two great gaps.

Sickened, I saw fragments of man and horse fly. Another arm javelined from its place like a flying snake, clicked at the end of another, became a hundred-foot chain which swirled like a flail through the huddling ma.s.s. Down upon a knot of the soldiers with a straight-forward blow drove a third arm, driving through them like a giant punch.

All that host which had driven us from the ruins threw down sword, spear, and pike; fled shrieking. The hors.e.m.e.n spurred their mounts, riding heedless over the footmen who fled with them.

The Smiting Thing seemed to watch them go with--AMUs.e.m.e.nT!

Before they could cover a hundred yards it had disintegrated. I heard the little wailing sounds--then behind the fleeing men, close behind them, rose the angled pillar; into place sprang the flexing arms, and again it took its toll of them.

They scattered, running singly, by twos, in little groups, for the sides of the valley. They were like rats scampering in panic over the bottom of a great green bowl. And like a monstrous cat the shape played with them--yes, PLAYED.

It melted once more--took new form. Where had been pillar and flailing arms was now a tripod thirty feet high, its legs alternate globe and cube and upon its apex a wide and spinning ring of sparkling spheres.

Out from the middle of this ring stretched a tentacle--writhing, undulating like a serpent of steel, four score yards at least in length.

At its end cube, globe and pyramid had mingled to form a huge trident.

With the three long p.r.o.ngs of this trident the thing struck, swiftly, with fearful precision--JOYOUSLY--tining those who fled, forking them, tossing them from its points high in air.

It was, I think, that last touch of sheer horror, the playfulness of the Smiting Thing, that sent my dry tongue to the roof of my terror-parched mouth, and held open with monstrous fascination eyes that struggled to close.

Ever the armored men fled from it, and ever was it swifter than they, teetering at their heels on its tripod legs.

From half its length the darting snake streamed red rain.

I heard a sigh from Ruth; wrested my gaze from the hollow; turned. She lay fainting in Drake's arms.

Beside the two the swathed woman stood, looking out upon that slaughter, calm and still, shrouded with an unearthly tranquillity--viewing it, it came to me, with eyes impersonal, cold, indifferent as the untroubled stars which look down upon hurricane and earthquake in this world of ours.

There was a rus.h.i.+ng of many feet at our left; a wail from Chiu-Ming.

Were they maddened by fear, driven by despair, determined to slay before they themselves were slain? I do not know. But those who still lived of the men from the tunnel mouth were charging us.

They cl.u.s.tered close, their s.h.i.+elds held before them. They had no bows, these men. They moved swiftly down upon us in silence--swords and pikes gleaming.

The Smiting Thing rocked toward us, the metal tentacle straining out like a rigid, racing serpent, flying to cut between its weird mistress and those who menaced her.

I heard Chiu-Ming scream; saw him throw up his hands, cover his eyes--run straight upon the pikes!

"Chiu-Ming!" I shouted. "Chiu-Ming! This way!"

I ran toward him. Before I had gone five paces Ventnor flashed by me, revolver spitting. I saw a spear thrown. It struck the Chinaman squarely in the breast. He tottered--fell upon his knees.

Even as he dropped, the giant flail swept down upon the soldiers. It swept through them like a scythe through ripe grain. It threw them, broken and torn, far toward the valley's sloping sides. It left only fragments that bore no semblance to men.

Ventnor was at Chiu-Ming's head; I dropped beside him. There was a crimson froth upon his lips.

"I thought that s.h.i.+n-Je was about to slay us," he whispered. "Fear blinded me."

His head dropped; his body quivered, lay still.

We arose, looked about us dazedly. At the side of the crevice stood the woman, her gaze resting upon Drake, his arms about Ruth, her head hidden on his breast.

The valley was empty--save for the huddled heaps that dotted it.

High up on the mountain path a score of figures crept, all that were left of those who but a little before had streamed down to take us captive or to slay. High up in the darkening heavens the lammergeiers, the winged scavengers of the Himalayas, were gathering.

The woman lifted her hand, beckoned us once more. Slowly we walked toward her, stood before her. The great clear eyes searched us--but no more intently than our own wondering eyes did her.

CHAPTER VI. NORHALA OF THE LIGHTNINGS

We looked upon a vision of loveliness such, I think, as none has beheld since Trojan Helen was a maid. At first all I could note were the eyes, clear as rain-washed April skies, crystal clear as some secret spring sacred to crescented Diana. Their wide gray irises were flecked with golden amber and sapphire--flecks that shone like cl.u.s.ters of little aureate and azure stars.

Then with a strange thrill of wonder I saw that these tiny constellations were not in the irises alone; that they cl.u.s.tered even within the pupils--deep within them, like far-flung stars in the depths of velvety, midnight heavens.

Whence had come those cold fires that had flared from them, I wondered--more menacing, far more menacing, in their cold tranquillity than the hot flames of wrath? These eyes were not perilous--no. Calm they were and still--yet in them a shadow of interest flickered; a ghost of friendliness smiled.

Above them were level, delicately penciled brows of bronze. The lips were coral crimson and--asleep. Sweet were those lips as ever master painter, dreaming his dream of the very soul of woman's sweetness, saw in vision and limned upon his canvas--and asleep, nor wistful for awakening.

A proud, straight nose; a broad low brow, and over it the ma.s.ses of the tendriling tresses--tawny, l.u.s.trous topaz, cloudy, METALLIC. Like spun silk of ruddy copper; and misty as the wisps of cloud that Soul'tze, G.o.ddess of Sleep, sets in the skies of dawn to catch the wandering dreams of lovers.

Down from the wondrous face melted the rounded column of her throat to merge into exquisite curves of shoulders and b.r.e.a.s.t.s, half revealed beneath the swathing veils.

But upon that face, within her eyes, kissing her red lips and clothing her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, was something unearthly.

Something that came straight out of the still mysteries of the star-filled s.p.a.ces; out of the ordered, the untroubled, the illimitable void.

A pa.s.sionless spirit that watched over the human pa.s.sion in the scarlet mouth, in every slumbering, sculptured line of her--guarding her against its awakening.

Twilight calm dropping down from the sun sleep to still the restless mountain tarn. Ishtar dreamlessly asleep within Nirvana.

Something not of this world we know--and yet of it as the winds of the Cosmos are to the summer breeze, the ocean to the wave, the lightnings to the glowworm.

"She isn't--human," I heard Ventnor whispering at my ear. "Look at her eyes; look at the skin of her--"

Her skin was white as milk of pearls; gossamer fine, silken and creamy; translucent as though a soft brilliancy dwelt within it. Beside it Ruth's fair skin was like some sun-and-wind-roughened country la.s.s's to t.i.tania's.

She studied us as though she were seeing for the first time beings of her own kind. She spoke--and her voice was elfin distant, chimingly sweet like hidden little golden bells; filled with that tranquil, far off spirit that was part of her--as though indeed a tiny golden chime should ring out from the silences, speak for them, find tongues for them. The words were hesitating, halting as though the lips that uttered them found speech strange--as strange as the clear eyes found our images.

And the words were Persian--purest, most ancient Persian.

"I am Norhala," the golden voice chimed forth, whispered down into silence. "I am Norhala."