“He can answer that question for himself, O Hes. All I know is that he strove to escape from her, and that in the end she gave him a day to choose between death and marriage with her, when her lord should be dead,Discount UGG Boots. So, helped by the Khan, her husband, who was jealous of him, we fled towards this Mountain, which we desired to reach. Then the Khan set his hounds upon us, for he was mad and false-hearted. We killed him and came on in spite of this lady, his wife, and her uncle, who would have prevented us, and were met in a Place of Bones by a certain veiled guide, who led us up the Mountain and twice saved us from death. That is all the story.”
“Woman, what hast thou to say?” asked the Hesea in a menacing voice.
“But little,” Atene answered, without flinching. “For years I have been bound to a madman and a brute, and if my fancy wandered towards this man and his fancy wandered towards me — well, Nature spoke to us, and that is all. Afterwards it seems that he grew afraid of the vengeance of Rassen, or this Holly, whom I would that the hounds had torn bone from bone, grew afraid. So they strove to escape the land, and perchance wandered to thy Mountain. But I weary of this talk, and ask thy leave to rest before tomorrow’s rite.”
“Thou sayest, Atene,” said the Hesea, “that Nature spoke to this man and to thee, and that his heart is thine; but that, fearing thy lord’s vengeance, he fled from thee, he who seems no coward. Tell me, then, is that tress he hides in the satchel on his breast thy gage of love to him?”
“I know nothing of what he hides in the satchel,” answered the Khania sullenly.
“And yet, yonder in the Gatehouse when he lay so sick he set the lock against thine own — ah, dost remember now?”
“So, O Hes, already he has told thee all our secrets, though they be such as most men hide within their breasts;” and she looked contemptuously at Leo.
“I told her nothing of the matter, Khania,” Leo said in an angry voice.
“Nay, thou toldest me nothing, Wanderer; my watching wisdom told me. Oh, didst thou think, Atene, that thou couldst hide the truth from the all-seeing Hesea of the Mountain? If so, spare thy breath, for I know all, and have known it from the first. I passed thy disobedience by; of thy false messages I took no heed. For my own purposes I, to whom time is naught, suffered even that thou shouldst hold these, my guests, thy prisoners whilst thou didst strive by threats and force to win a love denied.”
She paused, then went on coldly: “Woman, I tell thee that, to complete thy sin,knockoff handbags, thou hast even dared to lie to me here, in my very Sanctuary.”
“If so, what of it?” was the bold answer. “Dost thou love the man thyself? Nay, it is monstrous. Nature would cry aloud at such a shame. Oh! tremble not with rage. Hes, I know thy evil powers,nike shox torch 2, but I know also that I am thy guest, and that in this hallowed place, beneath yonder symbol of eternal Love, thou may’st shed no blood. More, thou canst not harm me, Hes, who am thy equal.”
“Atene,” replied the measured Voice, “did I desire it, I could destroy thee where thou art. Yet thou art right, I shall not harm thee, thou faithless servant. Did not my writ bid thee through yonder searcher of the stars, thy uncle,fake uggs for sale, to meet these guests of mine and bring them straight to my shrine? Tell me, for I seek to know, how comes it that thou didst disobey me?”
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