He went away from the thicket, carrying his burden. Back across the clearing, where two great males were already fighting over a she, out into the open space before the royal box, where all could plainly see.
He lifted the thing over his head, high into the sunlight.
"Here!" he shouted. "Don't you recognize her? Last of the royal house of Valkis—the Lady Fand!"
Around a portion of the wriggling anatomy that might once have been a neck, the collar of golden plaques swung shining.
For a moment he held her so, while the faces of the Martians stared like the masks of dead men and Kor Hal rose and gripped the edges of the stone. Then he laid his burden down and stepped back from it where it moved horribly across the turf.
"Look there, you Martians," he said. "That is your own beginning."
In the utter, stricken silence the old woman rose. She stood for a moment looking down, and it seemed that she was about to speak or cry out, but no sound came. Then she fell, out over the wall and down the sheer drop into the arena. She did not move again.
As though she had led them, the Martians rose with one low terrible cry and followed her. Not to death, as they dropped over the wall, but to vengeance.
Winters ran. He had Jill free in a minute, dragging her away into denser cover. The mouth of the tunnel was not far distant.