“Osman—they will crush you . . . between . . . stones . . . for this,” he mumbled.
She shook her head. “No, great one, they will not catch me. I have three more poisoned beads.” She held up the remnant of her black necklace.
So that was how it was done. In the tea. By restoring her the trinkets he had compassed his own end. His eyelids drooped, he was away, adrift again in that old dream he had had, rocking in the smuggler’s boat under Black Carn, floating through star-trembling space, among somber continents of cloud, a wraith borne onwards, downwards on streaming air-ways into everlasting darkness.
“Great Lord of lances,” came a whisper out of nowhere. “When thou art in Gehenna thou wilt remember me, thy slave.”
He fought back to consciousness, battled with smothering wraps of swansdown, through fogs of choking gray and yellow, through pouring waters of oblivion, came out sweating into the light, saw through a haze a shadow girl bending over him, the red glimmer of the brazier.
With an immense effort he lifted his foot into the coals, bit hard into his under-lip. “Not yet, not yet!”
The girl displayed amusement. “Wouldst burn before thy time? Burn on. Thou wilt take no more women of my race against their wish, Kaid—or any other women—though methinks thy lesson is learned overlate.
“Why fight the sleep, Roumi? It will come, it will come. The Rif herb never fails.” On she went with her bitter raillery, on and on.
But Ortho was holding his own. He was his mother’s son and had inherited all her marvelous vitality. The pain in his burnt foot was counteracting the drowse, sweat was pouring out of him. The crisis was past. Could he but crawl to the door? Not yet; in a minute or two. That negress must be back soon. He bit into his bleeding lip again, closed his eyes. The girl bent forward eagerly.
“It is death, Kaid. Thou art dying, dying!”