In vain he straightened up to his towering height and shook his sweep of shoulders. His terrible grip was broken.
Polaris suddenly loosed his hold, passed his arms up within those of the prince, and brought them down with elbows bended, freeing himself entirely. He caught Minos by the wrists, and exerting a strength that almost crushed the bones, he pressed downward swiftly and relentlessly.
The Prince of Sardanes knelt on the bare rock at the feet of the son of the snows.
No word had been spoken. Polaris let fall his enemy's wrists, and pointed along the mountainside toward the pass that led into the valley.
"Yonder lieth thy way, back to Sardanes, prince," he said gently. "Go back to thy people and rule them wisely, O Minos. Seek not to follow us. We go hence on a far journey, and will not be denied or turned. As to the strife that hath arisen, no man can regret it more than I. Farewell."
Minos answered not, and Polaris turned to the girl and the priest. He saw that all was in readiness for their going. Tethered to a tree below them in the mountain's belt of green were the snorting ponies. He threw out his arm in a sweeping gesture. "The way to the north is open," he said. "Let us be going."
CHAPTER XIX
KALIN WINS HIS KNOWLEDGE
For fifty miles Polaris and Kalin drove the Sardanian ponies along the Hunters' Road, while the dogs of the pack raced strong and free at the sides of the sledge. Alas, it was now but a five-dog pack! Octavius had given his life in the crater, in the mad fight to avenge the death of Pallas. Two Sardanians had fallen under his gashing jaws when a spear-thrust found his vitals, and in his death-pain he had leaped over the rim of the fire-pit to the molten lake in the depths.