I knew that we were very near to the stair's top, by then, but although we knew the metal cover of the shaft was not in place, there was no light from the great opening above us, the great temple being as dark as the shaft below it.
"Pray God there are no guards at the top of the stair," I cried to Lantin, as we sped upward. He did not answer, and from his agonized breathing I knew that he was out of wind from our long, torturing climb. And, away across the shaft now, there was a chorus of shouts as the guards beneath raced after us. Their cries halted for a moment, and by this I knew that they had found the body of the man I had killed. Then, with yelps of rage, they sped on after us.
We staggered drunkenly up the last curve of the stair. Out of the darkness appeared the little collapsible stairway which joined the temple's black ring of flooring with the great spiral on which we stood. There was no sign of the presence of any guards around or above it, so I jerked out the sword at my belt, and clasping it in one hand, strode cautiously up the little stair until I stood on the black flooring that was the rim of the shaft up which we had come.
Dense darkness reigned in the gigantic building, and the complete silence in it showed me that it was deserted. Lantin was beside me now, and the cries of the pursuing guards were ringing up the shaft ever louder, as they neared us. I sprang to the building's wall, clawing frantically along its side.
Abruptly my hands encountered the thick lever I was searching for, and as I jerked it down as far as it would go, I sobbed with relief. There was a loud click, and the little collapsible stair swung up and folded into an aperture in the wall.
"That will hold them on the stair, for a time," I told my friend, who had come up to me and was grasping my arm. As we raced around the wall to the building's entrance and exit, I explained in a few words what I had done. It was well for us, too, that I had remembered how the little stair was folded and unfolded, for as we sped down the tunneled gateway to the outside air, there came a shout of baffled rage from behind us, as the guards on the stair found their progress thus stopped.
Speeding down the arched tunnel through the temple's great wall, we emerged at last into the open air. For a moment, heedless of the clamor in the temple behind us, we stood with swelling hearts, breathing in the free air, expanding, almost, there beneath the limitless sky, after our sojourn in the cramped cavern below.
Darkness reigned over the city of the Kanlars, a darkness intensified by the absence of moon or stars above. From where we stood, the broad street, plashed with ruddy light from the glowing bulbs along its length, stretched away to the east, piercing the mass of winking lights that betokened the city's presence. Even from where we stood, we could see that there were many of the guards in the street, and there was no chance of our passing them unchallenged.
I turned to Lantin, but before I could speak we both shrank back into the temple's entrance. Footsteps were sounding on the ground near us, coming toward us along the outside of the temple's wall!