“Never! I will not come!” she said, but she spoke so low, so hoarsely, that only the stranger heard it. “My God, my God, help me in this star! Come quickly, else I lose my soul!”
Ah, that was a cry which it seemed all the stars might hear. The brilliance lifted above the skylike fog, and all the snowy wastes outside were visible. There were troops of awakened bird people flinging themselves in flocks against the wall. There were ranks of elf men raging and hammering at the wall. There was Regan awake, desperately trying to break down the barrier. There was Father Renaudin hastening to the spot from the far distant palace.
Rondah did not see that the clouds had lifted but all the Star saw her, saw her with cries of horror and despair, and with increase of futile rage.
“You will go, oh, Rondah! I cannot leave you forever! I love you!”
“Go, go!” cried Rondah. “I will never leave the star!”
There was again that shuddering wail. An agony was in its sound which woke all the other sleepers in the snow. It was the wail of lost souls!
The man turned away, dashing Rondah’s hands from his hold. He flung shiny wings, which were hidden ’neath his robe, into the air, and in a second was in the clouds, his superb beauty changed to a loathsome darkness, his face grinning and horrid, as with his hands he clutched at her—the woman alone on the Sun Island. He howled at her and he shrieked at her.
The sky began to flicker with lights; these changed to seraphic faces. A thrilling, tremendous chorus of words sounded in the air around:
“Blessed art thou, woman of Earth! Millions of souls hast thou saved this day!”
Then it faded. The air was silent. The music of the Sun Island was dead forever.