Hoik looked up with sudden awe, as the man died. Nelson knew that he too now was hearing that solemn voice.
"You who shall come after us, take warning!"
* * *
It was dawn when Nelson came with Nsharra out of the Cavern. L'Lan lay before them in the rising sun, a valley half blackened and blasted by fire. The bubble-domes of Vruun glittered amid smoking ashes.
"But all the valley east of the river was untouched by fire," Nsharra said. "It is enough until the forests grow again."
The Humanites were gone — their warriors, led by Hoik, had gone back to Anshan. And they had gone silently and heavily.
It was not only because their leader was dead, their outland mercenaries and weapons lost, their campaign a failure. It was because the whole basis of their ambition for human supremacy had been swept away by the revelation of the ancients.
For Hoik had obeyed the dying command of Shan Kar and had brought the Humanites, one by one, into the Cavern to hear that mighty message of the ancients. And they had listened in sick silence.
"We know that we are guilty of wrong," Hoik had said, in parting. "But we will strive to redress the wrong. Anshan shall be a city of the Brotherhood as of old."
"The past is done," Nsharra had answered. "Let there be peace now in L'Lan."