“Why, one would think the very Fates themselves were fighting against us if that were true, and were bringing the world to an end just as we have conquered it for our own! “As for these Aerians,” she continued, turning upon Alan and Alma and taking a couple of steps towards them, “they have come here with this wild story to cover an attempt to make terms with us before it is too late. It is a trick to deceive you, but it shall not succeed in my presence. Do you not remember how, upon this very spot little more than a year ago, I showed you this same Alan Arnold, who now comes preaching about his Truce of God, as the shameless liar and traitor that he is.” She had thrown off all disguise and all restraint now. Hatred was shining out of her eyes and open scorn was upon her lips. She waved her hand with a contemptuous gesture towards them and went on-- “If you have come to ask for terms of peace, be honest and say so. You need not fear to speak, for there may be conditions on which we will let you live.” Khalid was about to utter some reproof, and Alan’s hand had gone instinctively to the hilt of his rapier, when Alma stepped forward and faced Olga, her own eyes now burning dark with anger and her cheeks flushed with the hot blood which Olga’s insult had called to them. “Make terms with you!” she said, looking down upon her from the height of her splendid stature. “With you, who have laid the earth waste and made the habitations of men desolate--with you, whom I could strike dead at my feet without staining my hand by laying it upon you! It is for you to make terms, if you can, not with us but with the Heaven whose justice you have outraged and whose patience you have scorned! “Cease this idle talk of battle and conquest, this impious defiance of the decrees of Fate! Can you make terms with God? If so, then when you see His sign blazing in the heavens to-night cause it to change its path and pass aside from the earth. If not kneel down and pray, not for your life, for that would be useless, but for strength to meet your end in the midst of the desolation that you have created!” Olga heard her in silence to the end, her whole being shaken with the tempest of passion that Alma’s words set raging in her breast. For a moment she stood speechless, white to the lips, and trembling in every limb from very rage. Then she suddenly stepped back a pace, and cried in a voice more like the cry of a wild animal in pain than human speech-- “Whether the world lives or not _you_ shall not, whatever comes!” and as she spoke she snatched a pistol out of her girdle and levelled it at Alma’s heart. Before she could spring the lock Alan had snatched Alma up in his arms and Khalid, with a cry of horror and anger, had sprung forward and grasped Olga’s wrist.