Page:Amazing Stories Volume 15 Number 12.djvu/78

78 seized, save that most of them were now partially denuded. Prismatic light, glorious rainbow sheen as though from a painter's palette, bathed them as they stood terrified, clutching at each other.

On each of them was a big ticket, with a number. The men were jostling each other, crowding around the raised platform, noting the numbers, calling out to each other the number which they hoped they would get. Roistering men examingexamining [sic] the prizes now to be awarded them.

Facing the girls' platform at a distance of some fifty feet, a raised dais stood with its back against a dark little rock-cliff. Dais with a great golden, canopied throne. I sucked in my breath as I stared, and felt young Blake tense beside me. Tork was on the throne—Tork resplendent with pilfered stolen robe of red and ermine. And it was Doris beside him. Doris, gentle, dove-like with a great headdress and a long shimmering blue robe.

She sat white-faced. Her lips had been carmined; her brows heavily pencilled. Her eyes were wide; terrified, wondering—gazing at the fantastic motley world, incomprehensible to her.

The lights here were like a five hundred foot spot of rainbow. Beyond it, the dusk was gathering. Blurred stars were in the sky. The distant sea was a sullen surface of dark glass; the hills close at hand held purple shadows. And on the nearby slopes a great throng of the little lumps of humans were gathering. Like animals attracted by the lights—gathering, milling among themselves at a safe distance. Their jabbering voices blended with the other sounds.

Behind us, the strange village now was deserted, just a few spots of radiance in the house windows. And beyond the hill corner, the long dark outlines of the time-ship were apparent, merged with the purple rocky hillside behind it.

"The ticket-drawing," Blake muttered to me. "They're starting. Oh Bob—what the devil can we do—Doris there—if only—"

OTHING that we could do. Here beside us our guards were alert. Then I saw, on the throne-dais to one side of Tork, the woman Rhadana was standing. Soft music from some distant point flooded the scene. Rhadana stood swaying to it, instinctive sway perhaps.

She was dressed differently now. Scarf around her hips; breastplates; and over her nearly nude body a flow of gauze crimson draperies. A shaft of light struck her sensuous face. Venom was on it as she gazed at Tork, with her hand sliding under her draperies to her hip.

And then I saw the burly, red-shirted Greggson. He was near Rhadana; watching her. And then slowly I saw him edging toward Tork.

The lottery. A huge brazier of cloisonné stood before Doris. One by one now, Tork was calling the men's names. One by one they came and Doris, reaching into the brazier, handed them a ticket. Their shouts presently were rising: then they were at the girls' platform, dragging down the girls which had been given them, embracing them—and standing aside in couples, waiting impatiently for Tork, their Emperor, to address them.

Some of the girls were passive, numbed; others struggled, fought with little whimpering screams against the crude caresses forced upon them.

Breathless drama, pregnant with silent expectancy that seemed about to burst into a scream. Tork was on his feet now, with Doris standing beside him. His arms raised with an imperious gesture as he made ready to address his people. There was a breathless in-