Never have I seen that beautiful face more beautiful than it was at that moment. It seemed incredible that one so lovely could yet harbor within her fair bosom a heart so cruel and relentless, and today there was a new expression in her wondrous eyes that I never before had seen there—an unfamiliar softness, and a look of suffering.
Thurid was beside her now—pushing past to reach me first, and then what happened happened so quickly that it was all over before I could realize the truth of it.
Phaidor’s slim hand shot out to close upon the black’s dagger wrist. Her right hand went high with its gleaming blade.
“That for Matai Shang!” she cried, and she buried her blade deep in the dator’s breast. “That for the wrong you would have done Dejah Thoris!” and again the sharp steel sank into the bloody flesh.
“And that, and that, and that!” she shrieked, “for John Carter, Prince of Helium,” and with each word her sharp point pierced the vile heart of the great villain. Then, with a vindictive shove she cast the carcass of the First Born from the deck to fall in awful silence after the body of his victim.
I had been so paralyzed by surprise that I had made no move to reach the deck during the awe-inspiring scene which I had just witnessed, and now I was to be still further amazed by her next act, for Phaidor extended her hand to me and assisted me to the deck, where I stood gazing at her in unconcealed and stupefied wonderment.
A wan smile touched her lips—it was not the cruel and haughty smile of the goddess with which I was familiar. “You wonder, John Carter,” she said, “what strange thing has wrought this change in me? I will tell you. It is love—love of you,” and when I darkened my brows in disapproval of her words she raised an appealing hand.
“Wait,” she said. “It is a different love from mine—it is the love of your princess, Dejah Thoris, for you that has taught me what true love may be—what it should be, and how far from real love was my selfish and jealous passion for you.
“Now I am different. Now could I love as Dejah Thoris loves, and so my only happiness can be to know that you and she are once more united, for in her alone can you find true happiness.
“But I am unhappy because of the wickedness that I have wrought. I have many sins to expiate, and though I be deathless, life is all too short for the atonement.