“All is lost, and yet not all whilst thou art left to me, my Nahua. If the Children of the Sun are false to their gods and themselves, if they give the land into the hands of the Strangers by fighting for it among themselves, is there not many a remote and unknown valley hidden away among our eternal mountains to which thou mayst fly with me and with a remnant of our people who may remain faithful? The land from the sea stretches away for ever so they tell me. Can we not escape out of this prison-house and in some far distant land, where these accursed Strangers can never follow us, found another empire and a new line of royal Incas?”
To his amazement Nahua drew herself up and shrank back for the first time from his proffered embrace, and as he stopped short and stared wide-eyed at her she said with distant and yet gentle dignity—
“My Lord has offered me the greatest honour that can befall a Daughter of the Sun. He has asked me to be not only his wife but his Coya and queen. He has the power to make me his slave, even as these brutal Strangers have made Lalla-Cica and her sisters their slaves. But by the Ancient Law he cannot make me his queen without my full and free consent, and his queen I will never be until he has taken that which is his own again. Not from the hands of the Strangers as he took this dishonoured diadem, but that which he shall have won in battle by the strength of his own right hand, and by the right hands of those who shall still bow faithful to him and the memory of his fathers. It is not that I love you less, my Lord,” she went on in a gentler tone, “for that would be impossible. It is that I love your honour and that of our ancient race more than life itself. Your slave I may be at your will, but—by the glory of our Father the Sun, by the unspeakable might and majesty of the Unnameable, I swear it—your wife and queen I will never be till I can take my lawful place beside you to rule over a people that is free!”
“And free it shall be!” cried Manco, roused by her words to all his old enthusiasm. “That holy oath which thou hast taken I take too. As thou hast sworn, so will I swear never to claim thee for my queen till I can set a worthy diadem upon thy brow. I will find a means of escape and this time I will not be caught. Ruminavi is still free and I will find him, and with him I will either win back what is lost, or thou shalt find me waiting for thee in the Mansions of the Sun. Surely there must be some way of escape even now.”
“There is, Lord, for we have found one for thee,” she said, her eyes suddenly filling with tears, and her voice broken by a sob which she tried in vain to repress. “But of that Anda-Huillac can tell thee better than I. Farewell, my Lord and my love—farewell!”
So saying she clasped her hands to her eyes, and before the Inca could make a motion to stop her or even say a word to call her back, she had fled swiftly and silently from the room.
CHAPTER III.
THE HOUR OF TRIAL
“Why has she gone? Why has she spoken to me in such a manner? It is the first time that her lips have ever spoken any but loving words to me. What is this new trouble that is about to fall upon me? Tell me quickly,” said Manco, turning almost angrily to the high priest.
“Lord,” replied the old man, bending his head humbly before him and yet speaking in strong and steady tone, “the meaning of it is this. The Princess Nahua, frail and tender though she may be in body, has a soul as strong and steadfast as any of the heroines of our ancient race. Nay, I will say that if the men of her race, the princes and warriors of the Sacred Blood, had had such wisdom and such steadfastness as hers the armed foot of the Stranger would not now be on our necks, nor would our most sacred things be the sport of his greed and his lust.”
While he was speaking Manco had looked at him first in angry surprise and then with something very like shame. The blood began to glow red in his bronzed cheeks, and he even hung his head somewhat as he said—