"Ponder it well, my son," said the eunuch solemnly, "while I speed on to prepare the way. What art thou here?" he added, lowering his voice. "A hostage in a foeman's camp, at a woman's will. Behold, I can make thee the noblest leader on earth, and she, this veiled queen of a handful of horsemen, shall sit on the throne of a province larger than the great northern land we went out to conquer. What Baal offers, do not thou despise. Go to! Stretch forth thy hand, and take it whilst thou canst. To-morrow it may be too late. I have spoken."
Then, with a courteous farewell to the Anakim, he mounted into his chariot, and was gone, speeding, like some pestilent wind, towards the south on his mission of treachery, rebellion, and revenge.
CHAPTER LVI
REQUITED
"I have cast stones in the air to fall on mine own head! I have knelt at the stream, and, lo, the waters were bitter and defiled! O Kalmim, there is neither faith, nor honour, nor gratitude in Ninyas, the son of Ninus. May the king live for ever!"
She laughed outright. It was a rare jest to behold Sethos in a vein of serious reflection; above all, to hear him revile the prince to whom, through good and evil, he had been a devoted servant, notwithstanding the vices, caprices, and heartless ingratitude of his lord.
"You are but a child," she answered lightly, "and for all your downy lip and shapely limbs, not yet fit to run alone. Trust a strained bow, a frayed string, a blown horse, or a baffled woman—all these will quit them better in the hour of need than a king on the throne, whom you have served when he was a captive in the dungeon."
They were standing together on a terrace of the royal palace in Babylon, looking over many a league of gardens, vineyards, lofty palms, thin silvery streams—vast tracts of desert sand beyond—all shining and glowing in the bright morning sun, while their own comely faces and splendid attire were rich and deep in colour as the surrounding hues of earth and sky.
A great change had indeed taken place at home, since the queen's expedition to Armenia left the city without a ruler, while its lawful prince languished a weary prisoner, losing health, energy, and all the dignity of manhood, under supervision of the priests of Baal. The return of Assarac, bearing, as he affirmed, full powers and authority on the part of Semiramis, sickening even to death in the far north, had extricated Ninyas from captivity, and placed him on the throne to which he was entitled by the laws of Shinar, the eunuch, in a secret interview, extorting a solemn oath of vengeance on the mother who had deprived him of his liberty and his empire. Broken in health and courage by close imprisonment, acting on a frame already yielding to the effects of unbridled indulgence, the young king was but a tool in the hands of Assarac, who soon conceived the idea of making him also a mere stepping-stone to the attainment of supreme power at which he aimed.