It was an awful sight; but still more awful, still more terrible was the object on which the eye rested when it was raised from Attila. A few cubits beyond him, in a seat wherein she had evidently waited his coming, sat Ildica, the beautiful Dalmatian bride. On a table beside her stood a lamp, just dying out; on her knee rested her right hand, with her fair delicate fingers clasped tight round the hilt of a small dagger, from the point of which some drops of blood had fallen upon her snowy garments; her other hand grasped tight the arm of the chair. One of the shining tresses of her long dark hair had dropped from the pin that held it, and fallen upon her bosom; but in all else her dress was as she had appeared at the altar. Her cheek, her brow, her neck, were clear and pale as alabaster. The only crimson left was in her lips.
Some have written that she was weeping, but they lied! She wept not. Not a drop of moisture was in her eye, though its liquid light, pure and unquenched, beamed there as bright as ever. But those dark lustrous eyes, as if the whole world had vanished from her thoughts, as if for her the whole universe, except one dark and fearful object, was annihilated, were fixed immoveable on the corpse of that mighty king, whom no warrior had been found to conquer, but who had fallen in the hour of joy, intemperance, and in consummate injustice, by her own weak, delicate hand.
The blows of Ardaric upon the door, the sound of his voice, the crashing of the shivered fastenings, the tread of many feet in that awful chamber, had not roused her, even in the slightest degree, from that deep trance of overpowering thought. Her ear seemed deafened, her eye blind, her lips dumb, her whole form turned into stone, by the gorgon aspect of the just but terrible deed which her own hand and mighty resolution had achieved.
Well might she so remain; for the stern and resolute men who now stood before her, accustomed as they were to blood and slaughter in all the fiercest forms, prepared, too, as they were for the sight of death, were, nevertheless, overawed by that still, solemn, fearful scene, and stood for a space gazing silently, as if they, also, were petrified with the objects they beheld.
The first who raised his eyes from Attila was he to whom that dim chamber contained an object dearer far than any other thing on earth; and, gazing for a moment upon her, he exclaimed, "Oh, Ildica! oh beloved! thou hast been true to me, indeed!"
The counter-charm was spoken; the beloved tones were heard. Ildica raised her eyes, started from her seat, gazed wildly upon him, and, with a loud, piercing shriek, fell senseless at his feet.
Theodore threw his arm round her, caught her from the ground, and pressing her tight to his bosom, placed himself opposite to the chieftains who had entered with him. Then raising the drawn sword, which still remained in his hand, towards the sky, he exclaimed, "Almighty God, I thank thee even for this day! Ardaric, Valamir, Onegisus, Edicon, call in your warriors! call them in, and let them slay us together, for this deed which she has done, and in which I glory! Had her hand not done it, mine should have striven to do it. Call them in, and let them mingle our blood together. Thrilled with the same emotions through life, and faithful unto death, that blood may well flow forth at the same moment; and still will it keep apart from that of Attila! Call them in! call them in! or, if ye be generous, plunge your own swords in our bosoms! Lo, here I drop my weapon, and offer you my throat!"
"Onegisus," said Ardaric, "Attila has died in doing an injustice. What sayest thou?"
Onegisus paused, and looked down, while many emotions were evidently contending in his breast. At length he raised his eyes to Ardaric, and said, "It must not be known that Attila died by the hand of a woman?"
"Wisely bethought!" cried Ardaric. "The shame would travel through the whole world! Let it be given forth that Attila has slain himself. See, she has dropped the dagger. Let it be laid beside him."