If she could but find even an embroidered baldrick, a jewelled dagger, whole and uninjured, something she might carry into the market, and sell for as many skekels of silver as would put food in her mouth, and enable her to continue those efforts for the delivery of Sarchedon, which should never cease but with her life!
Resolving to search the palace through, she pushed on, traversing the court she had lately entered, and so reached the well-known stairs leading to the women's apartment, that heretofore she had so often climbed dreamily thinking of her lover, or run down blithely with a smiling welcome for her sire. Here were indeed traces of deadly strife. Embroidered curtains, torn and disordered, dangled from the wall; defaced sculptures and shattered slabs encumbered the pavement; a slender column of bronze, supporting a brazier, was bent and twisted to its pedestal; a broken bow lay across a torch long since extinguished on the floor. The lower part of the hall was black in shadow, while a flood of moonlight bathed roof and rafters, painted wood-work, gilded pinnacle, all that elaborate ornament and finish which had been above the level of the conflict.
As her foot touched the first step, two lurid eyes glared on her through the darkness, and a long lean object glided swiftly by, brushing her garments as it passed.
It was the wild-dog disturbed from his loathsome meal.
She had no fear now; only a thrill of intense suffering, with a fierce hideous desire for revenge. Wreathing her white arms above her head, she flung herself down by something, that an instinct of love, stronger than the very horror of the situation, told her must be the remains of her father.
A cloven headpiece had rolled from the smooth and grinning skull. His fleshless fingers still closed round the handle of a sword. He lay where he fell, his face to heaven, grim, unyielding, defiant even in death; but the wild-dogs had stripped him to the bone, and it was a bare bleached skeleton against which Ishtar laid her pale and shuddering cheek.
There rose through roof and rafters, curdling her very blood, a shrill and piercing shriek. She never knew it was the wail of agony wrung from her by her own despair.
Alas for the brave spirit passed away, the loyal heart, cold and still, kind and true! He had been struck down in her defence; had been willing, eager, to purchase with drops of life-blood the brief moments that might have aided her to escape; his last blow struck on her behalf, his last breath drawn for the child who had sat on his knees and lain in his bosom. The noblest warrior that ever drew bow in the service of Ninus, fit leader of the brave who were arrayed under the banner of Ashur at his behest. She was proud of him even then.
As the moonbeams crept across the pavement where it lay, they were so far merciful, that they revealed to her the ghastly sight by imperceptible degrees. She seemed to gather strength from him whose blood ran in her veins, stretched out in that white distorted heap, scarce retaining a semblance of human form. She thought of him in the majesty of his strength, the pride and beauty of his manhood, recalling the broad hand that used to rest so lovingly on her head, the noble brow that never wore a frown for her; and the weight seemed lifted from her brain, the iron probe taken out of her heart, while sobs convulsed her bosom, and scalding tears rushed to her eyes.
She became human again. She was a woman now, and she wept.