When they came to the pass gashed in the foot-hills, where the snow waves broke at the lips of the warm slopes, Polaris outspanned the outworn ponies, and dismissed them with a parting crack of the long whip. Freed of their burdens, the tired little beasts scuttled away up the rocky hillsides, betaking themselves to soft pastures, to forget the voice of the lash and the galling harness.
Polaris and Marcus climbed the pass, and stood again at the brink of the ledge of rock that overlooked the valley. Below them in the sunshine lay Sardanes, never more peaceful. Men were working in the fields, women singing from the homes and children were at play in the meadows. Under its green bridges the little river rippled to the hill's foot, its waterfall murmuring from the distance.
Above it all, for an instant, Polaris stood gazing down, with no peace of spirit, his heart and brain a red and raging fury. Sardanes's evil genius was at her gates.
Through the forests to the left the man and dog skirted the meadows where none might see them, headed straight to the terraced declivity of the Gateway to the Future. None was there to meet them as they set foot on the last terrace and the house of the priest lay before them; but a welcome sound greeted the ears of Polaris. It was the howling of the dogs, which Marcus would have answered. A stern word silenced him.
At the very threshold of the house of Kalin, the priest met Polaris. His face was drawn and anxious and his right hand was bound in a white bandage. At sight of the son of the snows and his gray body-guard. Kalin started and a strange look passed athwart his melancholy features.
Without setting foot on the door-stone, Polaris called sternly: "Greeting to thee, Kalin the Priest. Tell me, and waste not thy words in the telling, where fares the Rose?"
Kalin threw forth his uninjured hand in a bitter gesture. "The Prince Helicon—" he answered hoarsely, but Polaris broke in:
"Ay, priest, Helicon holds the Rose. I learned as much but shortly. Now if there has been treachery here, I am minded that Marcus shall tear out a traitor's throat! Speak quickly. How falls it that the Rose is gone, that the prince breaks faith and that thou hast allowed it?"
Unmoved by the threat, Kalin bent his deep eyes on Polaris.