He hardly ever slept. Hour by hour he paced the paths of the upper terrace, before the carven portal of the cliff, until there came a day when he found that he could enter the winding way that led to the ancient temple of death on the crater ledge.
On the stone steps of the sanctuary the priest laid himself, worn out with his vigil, and there sleep bound him fast. For hours he slumbered on. He awoke with a great start of horror, the fear of a half-remembered dream, a monstrous vision. He rushed to the brink of the sheer ledge.
Hundreds of feet below him writhed the fiery lake, wafting upwards its roseate mists and vapors, as it had for centuries. It was once more at its ancient level—or was it below? He stared; and as he gazed, it seemed to him that, inch by inch, very slowly, the seething maelstrom was sinking!
Suddenly realization came to him. The flaming crown of the Gateway was gone. The fires of the Gateway were going!
Poised at the ledge's brink, he flung wide his arms. "Hephaistos! Hephaistos! Master, whither goest thou?" he shrieked. The dull rumble of the fires, the soughing of the wind in the mighty cone, the soft curling reek of the fire mists drifting by him were his only answer. Came the thought of those below in the valley, and he rushed from the temple and passed down the terraces.
Already snow was falling on their green declivity.
His appearance on the side of the mountain was greeted with a shivering moan from the people. When the Gateway had gone dark, and new terror had assailed them, they still had held to the word of the priest. No one of them set foot on the holy hill. Quaking, they crowded together at its foot and waited the coming of Analos. A thousand eyes were upon him as he went down the terraces—not the arrogant, masterful man they always had known him, but a bowed and silent figure, walking with folded arms and eyes cast down, great eyes that glowed but dimly in their caverns. Even so, he was still the master—and still mad.
As he paused on the lowermost terrace, they crowded closely about him. A nation held its breath and waited for his words. He raised his head and his gaze swept over the close ranks of the people. He held out his arms toward them in silence for a moment before he spoke.
"A message I bear to his people from the mighty Lord Hephaistos," he said clearly. "Patience for but a little time, and he shall hear it. But first I must go to Latmos. Take me thither."