the end I rescued her from that house of
bondage, and slew Urco while he strove to steal or stab her. This done,
I conquered Kari the Inca, who was as my brother, yet because I saved
your lady from his god the Sun, became my enemy, and together she and
I returned to this, her land. Now it is her will to wed me, as it has
always been mine to wed her, and here in front of all of you I take her
to wife, as she takes me to husband, hoping that for many years it may
be given to us to rule over you, and to our children after us. Yet I
warn you that although in the great war that has been, if with much
loss, we have held our own against all the hosts of Cuzco and won an
honourable peace, by this marriage of ours, which robs the Inca god of
one of a thousand brides, that peace is broken. Therefore in the future,
as in the past, there will be war between the Quichua and the Chanca
peoples."

"We know it," shouted the nobles. "War is decreed, let war come!"

"What would you have had me do?" I went on. "Leave your queen to
languish in the House of the Sun, wed to nothingness, or suffer her to
be dragged away to be one of Urco's women, or hand her back to Kari to
be slain as a sacrifice to a god whom you do not accept?"

"Nay!" they cried. "We would have her wed you, White Lord-from-the-Sea,
that she may become a mother of kings."

"So I thought, Chancas. Yet I warn you that there is trouble near. The
storm gathers and soon it will burst, since Kari is not one who breaks
his oaths."

"Why did you not kill him when he was in your hand, and take his
throne?" asked one.

"Because I could not. Because it would not have been pleasing to Heaven
that I should slay a man who for years had been as my brother. Because
in this way or in that the deed would have fallen back upon my head,
upon the head of the lady Quilla, and upon your heads also, O people of
the Chancas, because----"

At this moment there was disturbance at the end of the hall, and a
herald cried:

"An embassy! An embassy from Kari, the Inca."

"Let it be admitted," said Quilla.

Presently up the central passage marched the embassy with pomp, great
lords and "earmen," every man of them, and bowed before us.

"Your words?" said Quilla quietly.

"They are these, Lady," answered the spokesman of the party. "For the
last time the Inca demands that you should surrender yourself to be
sacrificed as one who has betrayed the Sun. He asks it of you since he
has learned