"Back!" shouted Ventnor."Back as far as you can!"On we raced; we reached the gateway of the cliffs; we dashed on and on--up the shining roadway toward the blue globe now a scant mile before us; ran sobbing, panting --ran, we knew, for our lives.
Out of the Pit came a sound--I cannot describe it!
An unutterably desolate, dreadful wail of despair, it shuddered past us like the groaning of a broken-hearted star--anguished and awesome.
It died.There rushed upon us a sea of that incredible loneliness, that longing for extinction that had assailed us in the haunted hollow where first we had seen Norhala.
But its billows were resistless, invincible.Beneath them we fell; were torn by desire for swift death.
Dimly, through fainting eyes, I saw a dazzling brilliancy fill the sky; heard with dying ears a chaotic, blasting roar.
A wave of air thicker than water caught us up, hurled us hundreds of yards forward.It dropped us; in its wake rushed another wave, withering, scorching.
It raced over us.Scorching though it was, within its heat was energizing, revivifying force; something that slew the deadly despair and fed the fading fires of life.
I staggered to my feet; looked back.The veils were gone.
The precipice walled gateway they had curtained was filled with a Plutonic glare as though it opened into the incandescent heart of a volcano.
Ventnor clutched my shoulder, spun me around.He pointed to the sapphire house, started to run to it.Far ahead I saw Drake, the body of the girl clasped to his breast.The heat became blasting, insupportable; my lungs burned.
Over the sky above the canyon streaked a serpentine chain of lightnings.A sudden cyclonic gust swept the cleft, whirling us like leaves toward the Pit.
I threw myself upon my face, clutching at the smooth rock.A volley of thunder burst--but not the thunder of the Metal Monster or its Hordes; no, the bellowing of the levins of our own earth.
And the wind was cold; it bathed the burning skin; laved the fevered lungs.
Again the sky was split by the lightnings.And roaring down from it in solid sheets came the rain.
From the Pit arose a hissing as though within it raged Babylonian Tiamat, Mother of Chaos, serpent dweller in the void; Midgard-snake of the ancient Norse holding in her coils the world.
Buffeted by wind, beaten down by rain, clinging to each other like drowning men, Ventnor and I pushed on to the elfin globe.The light was dying fast.By it we saw Drake pass within the portal with his burden.The light became embers; it went out; blackness clasped us.Guided by the lightnings, we beat our way to the door; passed through it.
In the electric glare we saw Drake bending over Ruth.
In it I saw a slide draw over the open portal through which shrieked the wind, streamed the rain.
As though its crystal panel was moved by unseen, gentle hands, the portal closed; the tempest shut out.
We dropped beside Ruth upon a pile of silken stuffs--awed, marveling, trembling with pity and--thanksgiving.
For we knew--each of us knew with an absolute definiteness as we crouched there among the racing, dancing black and silver shadows with which the lightnings filled the blue globe--that the Metal Monster was dead.
Slain by itself!
