A step sounded in the darkness. A hand was laid roughly upon his shoulder. He was jerked away from the eyepiece to face the two guards that had been patrolling the halls of the Museum. Saknarth opened his mouth. "I have seen on Kurnal—" he began, but a soldier clapped his hand over the astrologer's mouth and said gruffly, "Silence. Let not your mouth tell of the blasphemies seen through this instrument of the Devil." They gagged Saknarth and bound his hands and led him out of the hall, turned him over to imprisonment.
His trial was short and speedy. During the entire proceedings he remained gagged and bound so as to be unable to utter the blasphemies he might have seen. The priests passed quick judgment upon him for had he not been caught peering through the accursed instrument? There was naught for such but execution.
The guards led him out of the courtroom that morning and took him to a cell overlooking the place of execution. Here for the first time he was ungagged and unbound. The door rolled shut upon him and the locks clicked.
Saknarth gazed out of the barred window. The street was many feet below. He could not possibly shout down to the passers-by what he had learned. He looked wildly around him.
On a little table was parchment and crayon. He grasped these and quickly drew a series of ideographs. He wrote furiously for he had not much time.
He wrote about the lights and the Sign. He exhorted the reader to carry it to the astrologers and the men of learning. He declared the time had come to rise and strike for freedom.
Rising, Saknarth went over to the window, waiting. There were many going through the street below, but he waited for the best. There! A young man passing now. Upon his arm was the circle insignia of the Society of the One God. An intelligent look was in his eye.
Saknarth grasped the rolled manuscript and hurled it. Straight before the youth it fell. The young man picked it up, drew aside into a doorway opposite to read it. Hopefully the prisoner watched the expression on the youth's face, saw light spring into his eyes, saw a smile and a determined line spread over his face.
The reader looked up. Straight into Saknarth's eyes he gazed, then raised his hand in salute and hurried off down the street.
The Master Astrologer sat down upon his stool, waiting for the executioners. He was ready to die now; he had done his work.