Upon his arm he felt a hand. Turning, he saw Vreenya, the aged counselor. "Surely, O master, he shall not live, now you have conquered him? The boiling pit awaits. It is our custom--if you will!" Allan only shook his head. "All customs change, these times," he answered. "_I_ am your law! This man's life is needed, for he has good skill with metals. He shall live, but never shall he speak before the Folk again. I have said it!" To the waiting throng he turned again. "Ye have witnessed!" he cried, in a loud voice. "Now, have fear of me, your master! Once in the Battle of the Walls ye beheld death raining from my fire-bow. Once ye watched me vanquish your ruler, even the great Kamrou himself, and fling him far into the pit that boils. And now, for the third time, ye have seen. Remember well!" A stir ran through the multitude. He felt its potent meaning, and he understood. "I am the law!" he flung at them once more. "Declare it, all! Repeat!" The thousand-throated chorus: "_Thou art the law!_" boomed upward through the fog, rolled mightily against the towering cliff, and echoed thunderlike across the hot, black sea. "It is well!" he cried. "One more sleep, and then--then I choose from among ye two for the journey, two of your boldest and best. And that shall be the first journey of many, up to the better places that await ye, far beyond the pit!" Straining his eyes in the night, pierced only by the electric beam that ran and quavered rapidly over the broken forest-tops far below, Allan peered down and far ahead. The fire, the signal-fire he had told Beatrice to build upon the ledge--would he never sight it? Eagerly he scanned the dark horizon only just visible in the star-shine. Warmly the rushing night wind fanned his cheek; the roar of the motor and propellers, pulsating mightily, made music to his ears. For it sang: "Home again! Beatrice, and love once more!" Many long hours had passed since, his fuel-tanks replenished from the apparatus for distilling the crude naphtha, which he had installed during his first stay in the Abyss, he had risen a second time into that heavy, humid, purple-vapored air. With him he now bore Bremilu, the strong, and Zangamon, most expert of all the fishermen. Slung in the baggage-crate aft lay a large seine, certain supplies of fish, weed and eggs, and--from time to time noisily squawking--some half-dozen of the strange sea-birds, in a metal basket. The pioneers had insisted on taking these impedimenta with them, to bridge the gap of changed conditions, a precaution Stern had recognized as eminently sensible.