st. Bhanavar looked about her with rapid
eyes, murmuring, 'Oh, what a Chief is he! Oh that a cloud would fall, a
smoke arise, to blind these hosts, that I might sling my serpents on him
unseen, for I will not be vanquished, though it be by Ruark!' So she drew
to the King, and the altercation between them was fierce in the fury of
the battle, he saying, ''Tis a feint of the Chief, this challenge; and I
must succour the left of my army by the well, that he is overmatching
with numbers'; and she, 'If thou head them not, then will I, and thou
shalt behold a woman do what thou durst not, and lose her love and win
her scorn.' While they spake the Arabs they looked on seemed to flutter
and waver, and the Chief was backing to them, calling to them as 'twere
words of shame to rally them. Seeing this, Mashalleed charged against the
Chief once more, and lo! the Arabs opened to receive him, closing on his
band of warriors like waters whitened by the storm on a fleet of
swift-scudding vessels: and there was a dust and a tumult visible, such
as is seen in the darkness when a vessel struck by the lightning-bolt is
sinking--flashes of steel, lifting of hands, rolling of horsemen and
horses. Then Bhanavar groaned aloud, 'They are lost! Shame to us! only
one hope is left-that 'tis Ruark, this Chief!' Now, the view of the plain
cleared, and with it she beheld the army of Mashalleed broken, the King
borne down by a dust of Arabs; so she unveiled her face and rode on the
host with the horsemen that guarded her, glorious with a crown of gold
and the glowing Jewel on her brow. When she was a javelin's flight from
them the Arabs shouted and paused in terror, for the light of her head
was as the sun setting between clouds of thunder; but that Chief dashed
forward like a flame beaten level by the wind, crying, 'Bhanavar;
Bhanavar!' and she knew the features of Ruark; so she said, 'Even I!' And
he cried again, 'Bhanavar! Bhanavar!' and was as one stricken by a shaft.
Then Bhanavar threw on him certain of the horsemen with her, and he
suffered them without a sign to surround him and grasp his mare by the
bridle-rein, and bring him, disarmed, before the Queen. At sight of Ruark
a captive the Arabs fell into confusion, and lost heart, and were
speedily chased and scattered from the scene like a loose spray before
the wind; but Mashalleed the King rejoiced mightily and praised Bhanavar,
and the whole army of the King praised her, magnifying her.

Now,