CHAPTER III.
THE HOUR OF TRIAL
“Why has she gone? Why has she spoken to me in such a manner? It is the first time that her lips have ever spoken any but loving words to me. What is this new trouble that is about to fall upon me? Tell me quickly,” said Manco, turning almost angrily to the high priest.
“Lord,” replied the old man, bending his head humbly before him and yet speaking in strong and steady tone, “the meaning of it is this. The Princess Nahua, frail and tender though she may be in body, has a soul as strong and steadfast as any of the heroines of our ancient race. Nay, I will say that if the men of her race, the princes and warriors of the Sacred Blood, had had such wisdom and such steadfastness as hers the armed foot of the Stranger would not now be on our necks, nor would our most sacred things be the sport of his greed and his lust.”
While he was speaking Manco had looked at him first in angry surprise and then with something very like shame. The blood began to glow red in his bronzed cheeks, and he even hung his head somewhat as he said--
“It is an evil time for reproaches, Anda-Huillac. I have erred in judgment and I have been deceived, but neither the Usurper nor the Stranger has yet seen my back in battle, and the dearest wish of my soul is to be once more with Ruminavi at the head of our warriors, so that, if I could not win back what is lost, I might at least die as becomes my Blood in the strife for it. I have no care for this thing, dishonoured as it is by the touch of the Stranger!” he went on, kicking the borla into a corner of the room. “My only longing is now to fight and die as a simple Inca warrior. I long for battle with an even greater passion than I long for Nahua herself. Her words were bitter but true. What right has a king to claim his queen when he is crownless and throneless?”
“It is of that that she spoke, Lord----”
“Call me not Lord again,” the young Inca interrupted passionately. “It is not I who am Lord here. It is the Stranger. Call me Manco-Capac, since my name and its holy memories are all that our conquerors and plunderers have left me. Now say on.”
“The name of the Divine One is a better and prouder one now than any name of rank,” replied Anda-Huillac, bowing his head at the mention of it, “and therefore I will call thee Manco-Capac and tell thee that thy worthy wish may yet be gratified though the sacrifice may be great. Briefly, then, the matter stands thus: When our Father first looked upon his sorrowing children this morning the Princess Nahua came to me with the queen, thy mother. They had been taking counsel together, and the Princess Nahua, well knowing that the last hopes of the Children of the Sun rest now upon thee, swore upon the sacred emblems of the Sun an oath that may not be recalled, that since the land demands a sacrifice, that sacrifice shall be herself if needs be.”
“What? Nahua?” cried the young Inca, springing from the chair into which he had thrown himself after he had bidden the priest call him Lord no longer. “What? The purest and the holiest thing that is left in the land. It is impossible! The gods could not accept it, and, as for me, I would die first--ay, even as Atahuallpa did.”
“There is but that choice and another before thee, O my son and Son of him who was my Lord,” said the queen, suddenly drawing herself up to her full height and stretching her arms out towards him. “For thee it is escape and then either victory or a death worthy of thy father’s son. That is one choice. The other is captivity, dishonour to thee and all thy House, and such a death of shame as would make thy name unworthy to be spoken hereafter even by the lips of slaves. We know thy love and Nahua’s. She has chosen the chance of death for herself rather than the certainty of shame for thee, and she has consecrated her choice by an oath that may not be broken. Wilt thou do less, bearer of the Divine name and last hope of the Children of the Sun?”
“No, I will not. The choice is bitter, yet I thank thee, mother and queen, that thou hast shown me the only path that my feet can tread with honour. Now, Anda-Huillac, say on and tell me the plan. I will listen patiently and will say no more till I tell thee that, however desperate it may be and however bitter the cost, I will dare the venture. By the glory of our Father the Sun and the holiness of that which may not be named, I, Manco-Capac, swear it.”
As he ceased speaking he made with his lips the silent sign indicating the name of the Unnameable. Then, taking his mother by the hand, he led her to the seat he had just risen from, and, turning to Anda-Huillac, waited in silence for him to begin.
“My son,” he began, speaking now with an air of authority befitting not the subject of a fallen prince but as the chief priest of a pure and ancient faith and the lawful pontiff of the land, “that oath of thine has already been heard in the Mansions of the Sun and carried joy to the hearts of all the kings and heroes who have gone before thee. Now what is to be done is this.
“Thou knowest that these Spaniards have but two passions in life--greed and lust, and that their greed is greater than their lust. So great is it, indeed, that not all the treasures they have torn from our temples and our homes have satisfied it. Nay, they have rather increased it. Thou knowest also that for many days past thou hast been seeking with us and the remnant of the House of Nobles to persuade this Hernando Pizarro, who is now our master and thy gaoler, to let thee go to Yucay and there ransom thyself with great treasures whose hiding-place is now known only to thee, the last of the royal line. This he has so far refused, but now his soldiers have been clamouring for more treasures, and more especially those who have lost all they had by gaming to their companions. We have taken care that stories of this great treasure at Yucay should be well spread among them, and they have demanded that it shall be found and shared as the other was, and to this Hernando Pizarro, driven by his own greed and the fear of a revolt among the soldiers of the chief they call Almagro, has at last consented, but he has made hard terms, and these must of necessity be agreed to.”
The Inca raised his eyes quickly and made as though he would speak, but he remembered his promise and closed his lips again.
“The terms are these,” the high priest continued in a low, sad tone that told Manco only too clearly what was coming. “In the first place a guard of his own men mounted on their war-beasts are to go with thee, and if the treasure is not found they are to slay thee. But so great are their fears of being surrounded in the city and cut off by our armies, and so much greater are their fears and jealousies of each other, that only a very few will be spared, and these Ruminavi will be ready to deal with at the proper time and place. But the second condition is harder than this. It is that thy mother the queen and the Princess Nahua shall give themselves up into his hands to be dealt with as he may see fit shouldst thou not return. Thou wilt not return, son of Huayna-Capac, for thou hast already sworn the oath that may not be broken. They too have sworn it, and so, whatever may befall, thy feet have but one path to tread, and that path lies hence to Yucay. Now, Manco-Capac, I have spoken, and it is for thee to remember thy name and blood and rank.”
While Anda-Huillac had been saying these last words the blood had left Manco’s cheeks and the pale bronze of his skin had turned to a sickly yellow grey. His eyes, opened to their widest extent, showed the white all round the black, gleaming eyeballs. His white, strong teeth were clenched, and his lips, drawn back from them, gave them almost the appearance of a wild animal’s fangs. The countenance which was wont to look so kingly and noble now looked horrible. It was like the face of a corpse with living eyes glaring out of it.
Mama-Oello uttered a cry of terror and, rising from her seat, flung herself weeping on his breast and moaning that he was already dying. The touch of her hand and the sound of her voice recalled its wonted strength to the manhood which had staggered under the stroke of these terrible tidings. The life came back to his features and motion to his limbs as he returned her embrace. For a few brief moments of weakness he mingled his tears with hers, and then, drawing himself up, he put her gently but firmly away from him. As he did so he saw her reel. In an instant he had her in his arms and had laid her on a couch which stood against one of the walls. Then, drawing himself up again, he faced Anda-Huillac and said in a hard, dry, unnatural voice which the high priest hardly recognised as his--
“If the frail daughters of our Father can dare so greatly, is there anything that his sons should not dare? Come, Anda-Huillac, I have looked my last on those I love. To look upon them again might make a craven of me even now. Henceforth I am no longer a man. I will tear out of my heart every human passion save hate and revenge, and the oath that I have sworn I repeat once more, that it may bind me never, so long as my arm can strike a blow, to spare a Spanish man, woman, or child whose life it is given me to take, and as He who sees all things knows the righteousness of my vengeance, so may He help me to take it! Now let us go to this Spanish butcher and tell him lies like his own, and then may the gods grant that I may never look upon his face again until the hour in which I shall ask his innocent victims’ blood at his hands! Come, let us go, for the sooner this thing is done the better.”
And so saying, and without even one backward look at the prostrate form on the couch, he gripped the high priest by the arm and almost dragged him out of the chamber.