And, mayhaps, I had some little knowing of this thing, as I did pass,
drowsy, into slumber; and it is surely like that I slept the better for
it. Moreover, I was wondrous tired and worn, and thus did sleep very
strong and heavy; yet I mind me that my last dim thinkings were upon
that sweet maid I did go to find. And in slumber did I have speech with
her in dreams, and a strange happiness about me, and all seeming to be
touched by fairy-light, and freed from the sorrow of life.
And it was from a sweet and lovely sleeping, such as this, that I was
waked suddenly by a great and mighty sound; and I came instant to a
possessing of my senses; and I knew that the mighty Voice of the
Home-Call did go howling across the Night. And, swift and silent, I slid
the cloak from about me, and took the haft of that wondrous Diskos into
mine hand.
And I did look towards the Pyramid, quickly, for a message; for I had a
sure knowledge that there had a great Need arisen, and that some Terror
came towards me out of the Dark; else they had never waked all the Night
Land to a knowing that an human was abroad out of the Mighty Refuge.
And even as I did peer towards the Great Redoubt, I could not abide to
keep my gaze entire that way; but did take a large and fearful look all
about me; yet could make to see nothing; and so did stare, eager and
anxious, afar into the upper blackness of the Night, where did shine
that Final Light of the Tower of Observation; and the same while
crouched, and holding the Diskos, and making to glance across my
shoulders, and to watch for the message, and all in the same moment.
And then, afar upwards in the prodigious height, I did see the great,
and bright and quick darting flashes of a strange green fire, and did
know that they spelled to me in the Set-Speech a swift warning that a
grey monster, that was a Great Grey Man, had made scent of me in the
dark, and was even in that moment of time, crawling towards me through
the low moss-bushes that lay off beyond the fire-hole to my back. And
the message was sharp; and bade me to leap into the bushes unto my left;
and to hide there; so that I might chance to take the thing to an
advantage.
And, as may be thought, they had scarce flashed the tale unto me; but I
was gone in among the shadows of a clump of the moss-bush that did grow
anigh; and I sweat with a strange terror, and a cold and excited shaking
of the heart; yet was my spirit set strong to conquer.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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