Suddenly, while we looked, the rocky wall which the _Akka_had built at the cavern mouth--was not! It vanished, as though an unseen, unbelievably gigantic hand had with the lightning's speed swept it away.And with it vanished, too, long lines of the great amphibians close behind it.
Then down upon the ledge, dropping into the Crimson Sea, sending up geysers of ruby spray, dashing on the bridge, crushing the frog-men, fell a shower of stone, mingled with distorted shapes and fragments whose scales still flashed meteoric as they hurled from above.
"That which makes things fall upward," hissed Olaf.
"That which I saw in the garden of Lugur!"The fiendish agency of destruction which Marakinoff had revealed to Larry; the force that cut off gravitation and sent all things within its range racing outward into space!
And now over the debris upon the ledge, striking with long sword and daggers, here and there a captain flashing the green ray, moving on in ordered squares, came the soldiers of the Shining One.Nearer and nearer the verge of the ledge they pushed Nak's warriors.Leaping upon the dwarfs, smit-ing them with spear and club, with teeth and spur, the _Akka_fought like devils.Quivering under the ray, they leaped and dragged down and slew.
Now there was but one long line of the frog-men at the very edge of the cliff.
And ever the clouds of dancing, diamonded atoms grew thicker over them all!
That last thin line of the _Akka_ was going; yet they fought to the last, and none toppled over the lip without at least one of the armoured Murians in his arms.
My gaze dropped to the foot of the cliffs.Stretched along their length was a wide ribbon of beauty--a shimmering multitude of gleaming, pulsing, prismatic moons; glowing, glowing ever brighter, ever more wondrous--the gigantic Medusae globes feasting on dwarf and frog-man alike!
Across the waters, faintly, came a triumphant shouting from Lugur's and Yolara's men!
Was the ruddy light of the place lessening, growing paler, changing to a faint rose? There was an exclamation from Larry; something like hope relaxed the drawn muscles of his face.He pointed to the aureate dome wherein sat the Three--and then I saw!
Out of it, through the long transverse slit through which the Silent Ones kept their watch on cavern, bridge, and abyss, a torrent of the opalescent light was pouring.It cas-caded like a waterfall, and as it flowed it spread whirling out, in columns and eddies, clouds and wisps of misty, curdled coruscations.It hung like a veil over all the islands, filtering everywhere, driving back the crimson light as though possessed of impenetrable substance--and still it cast not the faintest shadowing upon our vision.
"Good God!" breathed Larry."Look!"
The radiance was marching--MARCHING--down the colossal bridge.
It moved swiftly, in some unthinkable way INTELLIGENTLY.
It swathed the _Akka_, and closer, ever closer it swept toward the approach upon which Yolara's men had now gained foothold.
From their ranks came flash after flash of the green ray --aimed at the abode! But as the light sped and struck the opalescence it was blotted out! The shimmering mists seemed to enfold, to dissipate it.
Lakla drew a deep breath.
"The Silent Ones forgive me for doubting them," she whispered; and again hope blossomed on her face even as it did on Larry's.
The frog-men were gaining.Clothed in the armour of that mist, they pressed back from the bridge-head the invaders.
There was another prodigious movement at the ends of the crescent, and racing up, pressing against the dwarfs, came other legions of Nak's warriors.And re-enforcing those out on the prodigious arch, the frog-men stationed in the gard-ens below us poured back to the castle and out through the open Portal.
