“My Tougtchi!” shouted Djamouk, “I hear my soul bidding my body farewell! I must go before my mind expires in the terrible gaze of this young sorceress!”
He turned, drifted like something misty to the solid wall.
“My soul be ransom for yours!” cried Yulun to Tressa. “Bar that man’s path to life!”
Tressa flung out her right hand and, with her forefinger, drew a barrier through space, bar above bar.
And Benton, half swooning on his bed, saw a cage of terrible and living light penning in Djamouk, who beat upon the incandescent bars and grasped them and clawed his way about, squealing like a tortured rat in a red-hot cage.
Through the deafening tumult Yulun’s voice cut like a sword:
“Their bodies are dying, Heart of a Rose!... Listen! I hear their souls bidding their minds farewell!”
And, after a dreadful silence: “The train speeding north carries two dead men! God is God. Niaz!”
The bars of living fire faded. Two cinder-like and shapeless shadows floated and eddied like whitened ashes stirred by a wind on the hearth; then drifted through the lamp-light, fading, dissolving, lost gradually in thin air.
Tressa, leaning back against the mantel, covered her face with both hands.