She grasped his hand and, stretching out her long, lean arm, pointed to it and said—
“Look, Prince and bearer of the Divine Name! My eyes are dim yet I can see it. Pichincha is putting on her fire-crown, and woe to the People of the Valley when it shall encircle her brows in all its flaming splendour! This night a deed of sin and horror has been done and the Divine Ones have seen it from the windows of the Mansions of the Sun, and they are angry. To-morrow a new reign will be begun with the torment and death of the innocent, if they in their anger do not stretch out their hands and do justice on the guilty. Nay, do not speak, Prince; thou hast come here to watch and not to speak.”
She ceased, still pointing towards the red glow in the sky, which, while she was speaking, had deepened and broadened; and now Manco, watching with straining eyes and bated breath, saw it broaden and deepen until he could see the jagged walls of the great crater standing out black and sharp against it, and above the ever-broadening glare perceived a long line of inky cloud like a pall of sable with a lining of flame.
Suddenly a dull roar of thunder seemed to roll up from the bowels of the earth and the cloud was rent in twain as though by a swift blast from the awakening monster’s throat. At the same instant a red-blue globe of fire rushed up out of the westward, sped across the sky, leaving a track of flame behind it, and then, in the mid-most heaven right over the city, it burst with a crash that shook the air and vanished.[8]
Manco, whose eyes, wide open and fixed with fear, had followed it in its awful course, covered his face with his hands and cowered shuddering at the old woman’s feet when the crash had passed; but soon another roll of thunder growled across the valley and he looked up to see what new horror was coming. The clouds above Pichincha were now leaping and tossing in billows of mingled flame and ink, and from behind the black crater walls shone the fierce red glare of the eternal fires, once more unchained after the imprisonment of centuries.
Then, as he watched, a thin tongue of flame, red as new-shed blood, crept out through a gap in the crater wall and began licking its way down through the crimson, gleaming snow on the mountain-side. At the same instant the thunder rolled out again deeper and louder than before, and he felt the great stone on which he crouched heave and reel beneath him.
As he sprang terror-stricken to his feet he saw Mama-Lupa stagger backwards, and he caught her in his arms to save her from falling from the altar. Again the stone reeled beneath them and he fell on his knees, dragging her down with him. But she freed herself instantly and, rising to her feet, she stood tall and menacing above him, pointing downwards towards the city, and cried in a shrill voice that rose almost to a scream—
“Go back, Manco-Capac, son of the race that is doomed, go back and tell them yonder that the Divine Ones are wrath with their children, and that in their anger they have unchained the demon powers which dwell beneath the mountains. Tell it in street and square, in palace and temple, that all may be ready, from the Inca on his couch of gold to the slave shivering in his hovel. Nay, have no fear for me, Prince, the Llapa[9] will not strike me, for I have work to do to-morrow. I must stay here and watch and listen and learn the things thou canst not understand. Now go, go with thy best speed, that the warning may not come too late, for the Llapa travels fast and no man knows when it may strike.”
Scarcely knowing what he did, Manco obeyed, and stumbled blindly down the steps. When he reached the ground he paused, breathing deeply, and strove to steady his whirling senses, his hands clasped tight over his wildly beating heart. Then, with a last look at the great altar-stone crowned by the tall figure of Mama-Lupa with her fluttering garments and outstreaming hair sharply outlined against the red glare in the sky beyond, he turned and sped down the mountain-side towards the city as fast as his fear-winged feet could carry him.