False—utterly false—to her womanhood, to her nation, Zollaria's magnet would plot even treason if thereby she fancied she could serve her ends. The realization burst on Croft with a force little short of appalling. Filled with an intolerable sense of loathing, he followed her back to Bandhor's palace, and then returned to Himyra, he opened the eyes of his physical form, and groaned. Sunlight fell into his chamber.
A semi-tropic warmth was all about him, and yet, all at once he shivered as with cold.
CHAPTER VIII
THE DREAM OF HELMOR
Kalamita and Ptah. He knew not wholly what they plotted, what plans might lie in their brains. Yet whatever they might intend certain it was that the death of Jason, son of Jason, was included in the plan. And whatever that plan might be, Croft was assured that the priest had taken time to weigh many matters while he bent above the entrails of the tabur suckling, before he had given voice to his none too explicit interpretation of their meaning.
Kalamita—beautiful toy of the Zollarian court, and Ptah, priest of the nation's god. And when had there been a time or age wherein the lure of woman, the craft of priest, had failed to largely determine the setting of the stage, when both had not been involved in plot and counterplot? He shivered again and sprang up.
Helmor alone, it would seem, stood now between Jason and destruction. And in that stand Helmor must be encouraged. He must be doubly warned that harm to the child meant nothing less than destruction to himself, the overthrow of his house. Such word might be sent him by the messenger who would carry an answer north to the borders of Mazhur. Yet before he could be sent some time must needs transpire, and, in the meantime, suddenly a thought seemed given birth in full form in Jason Croft's brain.
Like another experienced long before when as a spirit he battled to find a way to reach a physical union with Naia the one woman for whom his spirit hungered, it fired him with its potent meaning, set a light of deep-formed purpose in his eyes. Helmor of Zollaria could be warned—and warned in such fashion that one of his nature could scarcely fail to give heed—or so Croft believed. Meanwhile his own work waited, work which in view of his latest knowledge more than ever demanded speed.
He left the palace, entered his motur, parked now always in the red court in readiness for his demands, and drove swiftly to the shops, attended to such matters as demanded his immediate attention, and went on to the place where, when once the blimps were ready the hydrogen to inflate them would be formed.