Onward she came; and right and left the company made way for her. And Harun dropped his cord, began to mutter: "Allah akhbar! The maids of the Gardens of Fountains have come down to dwell amongst men!" But the stranger—spirit or woman, who might say?—came on till she stood before the three captives. At the mandate in her eyes all other eyes followed her. No more she sang, but spoke, proud as the queen of the genii legions.
"Hear! tremble! obey!" She held the emerald higher. At the sight thereof there was a new stir, new whispers; the Ismaelians were bowing to the pavement. "Behold it! The ring of Hassan Sabah, your lord! I say to you, whoever shall disobey the command of the bearer of this ring, be his merits never so great, Allah shall cut him off from the joys of Paradise! Obey! and the honeyed kiss of the daughters of the land of the River of Life is on your lips!"
She swept the flashing ring to and fro before the eyes of the cowering twenty.
"Reverence therefore the will of the bearer of the ring," she ran on; "obey, were it on the camel-driver's finger; obey the more, since it is on mine,—I, at whose word the hosts of the darkness fall trembling, at whose nod the troops of the upper winds fly obedient!"
Needless her exhortation. One cry from twenty: "We obey! We are your slaves, O lady of Allah's own beauty! O empress of genii and men!" And the stranger, scarce pausing, rushed on:—
"See! your judgment is false! See, I am sent by Allah to bring to naught your desires! I command—I, the blue-eyed maid of Yemen, whose walk is with the stars! Release these captives. Their doom is unwritten."
"ALL BLINDLY, HE KNEW THEY WERE MOUNTING STAIRWAYS"
Richard had beheld all as does the man treading in a dream; who knows he dreams, yet cannot waken. Dreaming, he had seen this strange spirit enter; dreaming, he heard; dreaming, he saw a quiver, as of resistance, pass round that ring of sculptured faces; the eyes bright as snakes, and more pitiless, questioned once,—once only. The deliverer shot across their company one lightning glance—majesty, supremacy, scorn. Still dreaming, Richard saw in her hand a dagger; and then—dreamt he still?—he felt the bands upon his arms sever. He stood free—and Godfrey and Musa free! But his protectress was speaking again:—