Tonight her mood was more somber than usual. Having obtained the guest list from a rebellious Tyrhia, she sent messages to the older and more sophisticated guests at the birthday party, bidding them remain after the younger fry had left.
It had occurred to her, disconcertingly, that she had no companion to share the later hours. She was almost tempted to recall Lustri. He had the faculty of arousing her to a superlative degree if she made her mind a perfect blank. She abandoned the thought with a sigh. How predictably tiresome he was. Then, who else? Mentally, she ran her eye over the guest roll, and her mouth drooped in distaste. Too young, too old, too anemic, too fat, too unsophisticated, too cynical, too ignorant, too desiccated by learning. Her mind even more than her body had to be intrigued, at least in the beginning.
She left the gallery for the banquet in bad humor. Fifty guests were awaiting the Empress’ arrival in the antechamber leading to the grand ballroom. Most were young, sons and daughters of Nobles and friends of Tyrhia. These included the sons of Cicio, King of Dimtri, and the children of Patus, King of Nahi. The young men were in white tunics, cinched at the waist with golden girdles. The young women were in translucent robes, through which shapely limbs gleamed with a subtle sensuality. The older guests, all men, were grave in their purple togas. They talked seriously among themselves, while glancing occasionally in amused indulgence at the callow young men. The young women received a more searching scrutiny, as practiced eyes appraised the gentle swell of a maidenly breast or sweetly enticing thigh.
In the midst of this byplay, the great bronze door at the end of the chamber opened softly, and the Empress, alone, unattended, stood in the high arched doorway. The corridor behind her was dim, but the blazing light from within struck her with a dazzling effect. She wore a long trailing robe of brilliant gold, bunched about her waist with a gem-studded sash. Her hair was entirely concealed by a close-fitting helmet, from which twelve golden spikes sprang some two feet. The dark brilliance of her eyes and the voluptuous red of her mouth stood out in the cold pallor of her face.
Though they had seen their Empress many times, the guests stared in admiring awe. It was almost as though the goddess Sati had made an appearance. With every movement, every gesture, her person blazed like the very sun itself.
At the banquet tables, the seating was such that each man had a maiden at either hand. Salustra had arranged, with an eye to the midnight festivities, that the jaded tastes of the older guests might throb with the anticipation that the downy-haired maidens would be counted on to arouse in them; to be later gratified by more experienced females than these unsophisticated adolescents.
The older men were plainly bored with the younger men, but obviously enjoyed the young women, making a game of teasing and fondling them, as though it were an impersonal tribute from those detached by the disparity of years. The wine was weak, cooled with glittering cubes of ice. Rare pheasants, roasted in wine-flavored sauce, tongues of nightingales, sturgeon from the north, exotic fruits, olives, golden cakes, tiny fish in their own oil, and scented sweetmeats were brought in on heavily laden platters by beautiful slaves nude from the waist up.
Tyrhia sat opposite her sister at the main table, her voice a trifle shrill with excitement, as she bantered archly with a young man next to her, from time to time playfully slapping a too bold and experimental hand.
Salustra sat impassively in her chair. She smiled perfunctorily, and with a visible effort. She confined most of her remarks to Mahius, who sat at her left.
She spoke to him in an undertone, not wanting the others to overhear. “What do thy geologists and astronomers say of this cursed mist?”
“My scientists?” The minister sighed.
“Do not quibble,” she snapped.
“Frankly, Majesty, like all who are confused, they talk a lot, without saying much. Molanti, the geologist, points out that this mist appeared a few days after a mysterious earth tremor to the north, picked up by the seismographs at the Geological Institute.
“In establishing a connection between that quake and the mist, Molanti believes he may yet account for the power failure.”
She muttered darkly to herself. “Theories, always theories. Tell Molanti it is answers we need. And if he solves this mystery, I shall see that he is accorded the rare privilege of the rejuvenation chamber.”
Mahius sighed heavily. “Are you so certain, Majesty, that this prolongation of life is a proper reward for such meritorious service?”
She smiled slyly. “Molanti, though a scientist, will consider this boon of youth worth more than a dozen palaces or the greenest grove. What do scientists know of life?”
“What do any of us know, Majesty?”
She smiled practically. “We know that life will be insufferable if we do not soon learn why the electricity normally conveyed through the atmosphere has dissipated.” She drew her lips together reflectively. “What says the physicist Goleta? He already has earned nomination for the Temple Beautiful for his discovery of the health ray.”
“Majesty, Goleta reports that the atmosphere is so lacking that the experimental electromagnetic signals he sends out produce not even the slightest static.”
Salustra showed signs of mounting irritation. “Do not these fools know that we cannot long live in this primitive manner? We are not barbarians like the Althrustri.”
Mahius shrugged as he pushed away his food, untasted. “Underrate not these barbarians, Majesty. They have the nuclear atmosphere-changer, and they will use it, if they can.”
Salustra looked at him thoughtfully. “So you have said, but it may not even go off in this deadened atmosphere.”
Mahius’ face turned gray. “But can we take the chance, Majesty?”
She clenched her teeth, thinking of the treachery that had given Signar this weapon. “To turn against one’s own country, it is unspeakable. Yet I am ever pleasantly surprised when a friend does not betray me.” She put out a hand reassuringly as Mahius flinched. “They shall pay, either at my hand or Signar’s. No ruler trusts him who betrays his own people.”
“They are so numerous, Majesty.”
“Yes, the rotten apple is not worth saving.”
He laughed mirthlessly. “Thou dost agree with the High Priestess Jupia, who prophesies some terrible catastrophe.”
The Empress snorted. “That old crone. She has been preaching doomsday ever since Sati closed her womb. How else can she express her frustrations?”
Her eyes ran over the glittering assemblage, lingering on the distinguished Nobles and Senators grouped around tables that had been lowered so that the feasting guests could sit or recline comfortably. They seemed oblivious of the multiplying threats to their country’s very existence. Masking an expression of disgust, she turned back to Mahius. “What else say these scientists of thine?”
Mahius shrugged. “Goleta and Molanti agree that the recent tremor was responsible for not only this accursed heaviness in the air but certain erratic movements in the ocean tides, which may affect all electric output before long.”
Salustra laughed bleakly.
“As any can see—” she pointed to slaves waving heavy fronds “—the palace cooling system has already stopped functioning.” She rested her chin in her hand. “Knowest thou for sure whether this atom-breaker was exploded underground or in the atmosphere?”
He nodded soberly. “I cannot be sure, Majesty, but even underground, it still might generate enough heat to thaw the frozen sea and send it tumbling down on our heads.”
She shook her head. “My scientists tell me that the subterranean earth mass safely contains an atomic blast and the ensuing radiation, but in the atmosphere there is a continuous chain reaction, with ever more heat and energy building up until the very skies take fire.”
Mahius gave an expressive shrug. “As thou knowest, the Atlantean atmosphere-changer was used but once, on an invading army of marauding dinosaurs. They not only vanished, but the vast territory they foraged vanished with them.�
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Her brows knit together. “And how long ago was this, Mahius?”
“Many centuries, Majesty.”
“And we have not used one since.”
“We are too civilized, Majesty.”
She made a wry face. “Not civilized, Mahius, decadent, degenerate, cowardly. We cannot stand the thought of inflicting death on millions, yet is it not as horrible to kill but one person? If that one life is of no importance, then a million times naught is no more important.”
As usual when he sat long, the Minister’s tired eyes became bleary and his gray head began to nod.
Tyrhia had looked up brightly from the young man so free with his hands.
“So solemn, Salustra, on my birthday?”
The incongruity of Tyrhia’s demeanor, in the face of a very real national danger, nettled Salustra more than she would have thought. “How like her mother,” she found herself thinking, even while admiring her brittle prettiness.
Before Salustra could frame a reply, a smoking brazier was thrust before her. She poured a goblet of wine upon it in honor of Sati. The fragrance of the perfumed libation hung in the warm atmosphere, as the shapely slaves, glistening in their nudity, moved on light feet to serve the guests.
Salustra continued to talk seriously to Mahius. She drank little of the weak wine, and then only with a wry mouth. “Thou wilt remain for the later feast, Mahius?”
He looked at the Empress with pleading eyes. “There will be women later, of course, Majesty?”
Salustra’s lip curled a little, and she inclined her head.
“No righteous virgins; no women with weak wine in their veins. But there will be females, I assure thee, Mahius.”
Mahius looked at her directly, and there was something in that steadfast regard that caused her to drop her eyes.
She glanced around the room, at the older men, scientists, philosophers, writers, engineers, musicians, sculptors, dramatists. Already these distinguished men were bored by the simpering maidens on either side, especially as all their overtures had met with embarrassed giggles and shrinking withdrawals. The maidens did not shrink so obviously from the younger men, not even when a casual hand dropped to a soft breast. The elders began to talk soberly over the heads of the maidens, and to count the hours with impatience.
Noticing all this, Salustra smiled to herself, looking to an early end of Tyrhia’s phase of the party.
“Thou wilt remain?” she insisted in that low and languid voice.
Mahius gave a troubled sigh. “Will it displease thy Majesty if I should refuse? I am very tired of late. I have a premonition of approaching disaster. I am not superstitious, but there is something in the air, something sinister. No, no! No human foe, no human danger, not this time. Forgive my drive-lings, great Salustra. The forewarnings of those artful astrologers have always aroused in me the deepest ridicule. No, no! It is something else, something most awful …”
Salustra looked at him with incredulous eyes. Her bosom rose, as though with suppressed laughter. “With what childish fear we cower in the shelter of the known, hiding from the cold winds of the unknown! A thousand legions could not disturb thy iron equanimity, Mahius, but the first breath from the black and icy cavern of superstition freezes the very marrow in thy bones! Bah! I have a most efficacious powder which my physician hath given me. It is a splendid laxative; it stirs up the bowels like the lash of a whip. Religion and her twin, superstition, are naught but the phantoms of a sluggish liver, Mahius!”
Mahius winced but made no reply.
She touched his arm lightly. “There are three times in a man’s life when he believes in the gods, Mahius. When he is a child, when well fed, and when he is old. Thou art old, dear friend. Thy blood no longer runs swift and hot; thy eye no longer wanders to virginal bosoms and young lips. Music fails to stir thee; thou wouldst return to thy books and to the grave contemplation of thy gods. The man who tells himself that he is old is old, no matter how few his years: the white-haired grandsire who assures himself that he is young is truly young.”
Mahius looked at her almost sadly. “I am old, Majesty,” he said quietly, “and thou are eternally young. Perhaps it is because I am old that I am afraid, that I feel something insidious in the air. Age is always apprehensive, I know. But when I look at thee, I am affrighted. It is as though I see a huge shadow over thee. Thou knowest how I love thee, and how I loved thy father, and thou canst judge how thought of danger to thee fills me with dread and confusion. Fear! I, who have never felt fear before, fear now, and its icy wind causes my teeth to chatter and my heart to chill.” So earnest, so urgent was his voice that the quiet smile faded from Salustra’s lips.
She reacted defiantly, affected more than she would admit. “Fear!” she said contemptuously. “Sati, I believe, can find it possible to forgive the fool, the adulterer, the liar and the traitor. She may even find extenuating circumstances for the hypocrite, for where is there one of us but is forced to dissemble in some manner? But I doubt that she can forgive the coward, who fills the dim and lofty halls of heaven with his pusillanimous cries and disturbs the most high Herself with his craven bleatings. And I, have I ever feared? Nay, fear hath never touched me with her shriveling hand. I come not of the blood of cowards, my Mahius!”
She touched her minister upon the cheek with the back of her hand, and then, as her mood swiftly changed, she experienced a sudden wave of melancholy. “This city, I loathe it, and I am weary. Dost know why those barbarian envoys of Signar’s have requested a special audience tomorrow?”
Mahius’ gray brows contracted in deep thought.
Salustra spread out her hands with a careless gesture. “I would like thee to come to my apartments for a few moments. These children will not miss us.”
She would have risen had not her eye suddenly been caught by another’s. A young man, of twenty-seven or eight, perhaps a trifle younger than herself, was peering at her intently over the brim of a goblet, from the far end of the table. She had never seen him before. As their eyes held, she saw a finely molded head and sensitive blue eyes. As she gazed at him, he put down the goblet slowly, revealing a straight, sculptured nose and a strong, yet delicate mouth. Her eye quickly took in the sturdy throat, wide shoulders, bare, sinewy arms and artistic hands. She studied him with a sense of growing excitement, and he returned her gaze breathlessly, yet with an air of confidence. She looked again at his face, and he smiled, inclining his head respectfully. He had an air of distinction so different from the youth of Lamora.
Mahius had been watching this little drama with a sense of weariness. He looked at the young man and frowned.
Salustra leaned back in her chair. A faint smile touched her lips. Her breast rose quickly with quickened breath. She was herself again.
“That, radiant Majesty, is a cousin of Cicio, King of Dimtri,” anticipated Mahius in a dry voice. “He beseeched me only this morning to request an interview for him. He is a poet of great renown in his country, and he seeks thy patronage, knowing thou art a devotee of the arts. His name is Erato.”
Salustra nodded slowly, keeping her eyes on the poet, who was now smiling quizzically. He lifted his goblet to his lips again, and on his hand a great ruby, like a ribald eye, winked brightly at her. Salustra smiled. “He must remain for the later banquet, Mahius. We are always willing to serve Poetry, especially when she hath so gallant and handsome an advocate.”
Salustra now rose, and the startled guests rose with her. She made a gesture with her jeweled hand. “We shall return,” she said and glided from the chamber, followed by the old minister. The poet smiled, and nervously drummed on the table with his fingers.
6
Far below lay the city. The streets were veiled in a yellowish gloom through which the lofty domes and tall pillars gleamed grotesquely in the obscure moonlight. It was a city of illusion, its distant confines hidden by the thick curtain that hung over the city like a pall. The air was hot, motionless, languid, causing men to breathe laboriousl
y in a depressed atmosphere and the animal life to scurry about in aimless apprehension.
Mahius, wondering at this sudden conference, glanced furtively at the Empress. Her profile held the eye with its pride and strength. She began to speak uncertainly, in a low voice, as though in a dream. “Wert thou ever afflicted with this strange emotion, Mahius? I am not a fanciful woman, or a morbid one. But I feel an awful sense of fatality upon me; the world has receded into unreality and illusion. I am a shadow moving amongst shadows.”
Mahius was silent for a moment, and then he replied quietly: “I have felt so often myself. Life fluctuates, flows, ebbs, comes from the shadows and returns to them. Only the gods remain, ever present and eternal.”
Salustra gave a weary gesture. “Bah! Gods! To think that in this world today, this ribald, jeering and cynical world, there should be some that believe that the great Unknown has cognizance of us! Only the frail, the feeble, the cowardly can have such faith. Faith is the trademark of the pusillanimous. Unable to fight life adequately, they feel the need of a supernatural ally, compelled to encase themselves in armor against a predatory world; otherwise raw and violent life would be unendurable. Some armor themselves with faith, and hide behind the shadowy image of the gods. Some encase themselves in philosophy, and look with a tranquil eye upon the combat, disdaining, however, to take part in it. Some arm themselves with cynicism and refuse to believe anything, even that they do not believe anything. Some saturate themselves with sentiment and observe life through deliciously maudlin tears. Some arm themselves with the stern ax of a self-inflicted duty, and call themselves brave when they are merely acquiescent. Nearly all justify life in terms of empty platitudes. If man did not lie to himself he could not live.”
The Romance of Atlantis Page 6
