And she started away from me, and in a moment might have been obscured amid the shadows.
But terror of losing her filled my heart; and I darted after her, and an instant later had her in my arms.
"Yasma! You shall not go! You shall not!" I found myself crying, in a frenzy that equalled her own. And my arms clung about her, and forced the quivering form closely to me. "You must not go! You cannot! You promised to stay! I will not let you go, I will not, will not!" And what more I said I cannot now recall; but I held her to me tenaciously, distractedly, in an abandon of fear and passion; and she could not struggle free from my clasp.
And as the darkness deepened, and a red rift in the clouds like a fiery omen marked the way of the setting sun, my madness subsided, and hers subsided too; and she lay in my arms, a limp, huddled mass.
"Let it be as you wish. I will not go," she was saying, in tones wherein there seemed to be scarcely a trace of life. "I will not go. I will stay with you here—if Yulada permits."
And she buried her face against my breast, and her whole form shook and shuddered. And as I reached out a trembling hand to comfort her, there came a weird querulous calling from the deep gloom above; and I knew that still another flying thing, perhaps the last, had gone gliding on its way beyond the mountains.
Chapter XXIV
THE WILL OF YULADA
Again it was winter in Sobul. The snow lay deep in the deserted fields, and in the woods it wove strange arabesques about the limbs of leafless trees; the mountains were white with vast majestic new draperies. At times the blizzards came moaning out of the northwest, with driving flakes and gales; at times the sky was icy clear and scarcely a breeze stirred amid the charmed silences. But whether the day was bright or tempest-blurred could matter little now, for all days alike were desolate in this saddest of winters.