Minos came and bade the lad enter the cave. He wriggled slowly, and with not a few groans, through the passage, and was helped over the rock. When they took him to the light, they found that he was in evil case. Most of his clothing had been torn from him, and he was bruised and with dried blood on his flesh.
"They have hunted me in the hills like a goat," he gasped, as he bent to kiss the hand of his master. "Thy palace is a dismal ruin, O king. Thy servants are scattered or slain. The stone with thy name on it has been cast down from above thy seat in the Judgment House. Even thy throne they toppled from its place and shattered."
The king turned from him sorrowfully. The hunters gathered round, and, as they tended the hurts of the lad, they sought news from him of their families.
"I can tell you naught," he said wearily, "but I believe that every soul in the valley that stood faithful to the king hath been sent to Hephaistos. The dead lie unburned in rows on the upper terraces of the Gateway. For in the hill the fires of the god do wax so mighty that none, not even his own priests, dares to come near to them. All upper Sardanes is snow and ice. Ten of the great moons have gone dark, and as they die the cold cometh on apace."
Then Alternes turned his face to the wall on the couch of skins where they had laid him, and slept long and well.
One more attempt Analos made to bring Minos to his will. The priest sent a delegation of all the lords of the valley to the cave-mouth. Minos came and talked with them over the fallen rock. To his side came the Lady Memene and leaned upon the stone, her chin upon her hands.
Ukalles, now an outcast from his home on Tanos in upper Sardanes, was spokesman for the nobles.
"We are sore beset of troubles, O Minos!" he cried. "The priest saith the land is doomed to the anger of the Lord Hephaistos, and day by day the doom marcheth. Thou dost stand against it and lure it on the people and on all of us, saith Analos. Wilt not yield to the god, and not let this fair valley perish, that hath stood for ages? Consider, for the people's sake—the people whom once thou didst love so well, and who love thee. It is promised thee that thou shalt not die if thou dost yield. Thou must, indeed, go to the Gateway and submit to what decree of punishment the god maketh, but not to death. Come, ere that we hold dear be gone, and Sardanes be blotted out."
"Strange is the love the people bear their king," answered Minos calmly. "Strange, indeed, when they have slain my servants, laid my palace in ruins, and stricken my very name from the seat of my fathers—"
"But that was by orders of the god through his priests," broke in Ukalles.