Out rang the merciless chimes of Norhala's laughter.
“Tchai!” she cried. “Tchai! Fat fool there. Tchai—you Cherkis! Toad whose wits have sickened with your years!
“Did you think to catch me, Norhala, in your filthy web? Princess! Queen! Empress of Earth! Ho—old fox I have outplayed and beaten, what now have you to trade with Norhala?”
Mouth sagging open, eyes glaring, the tyrant slowly raised his arms—a suppliant.
“You would have back the bridegroom you gave me?” she laughed. “Take him, then.”
Down swept the metal arm that held Kulun. The arm dropped Cherkis's son at Cherkis's feet; and as though Kulun had been a grape—it crushed him!
Before those who had seen could stir from their stupor the tentacle hovered over Cherkis, glaring down at the horror that had been his son.
It did not strike him—it drew him up to it as a magnet draws a pin.
And as the pin swings from the magnet when held suspended by the head, so swung the great body of Cherkis from the under side of the pyramid that held him. Hanging so he was carried toward us, came to a stop not ten feet from us—
Weird, weird beyond all telling was that scene—and would I had the power to make you who read see it as we did.