gave way, and fell clanging
in--and the yells of the besiegers came to the ears of the priests, as
though the cover had been taken from the caldron of hell, suffering the
din of the damned and their devils to burst forth in demoniac discord.

In an instant the temple was filled with a swarm of hideous men, whose
eyes were red with the lust of blood and their hands with slaughter.
Their crooked swords gleamed aloft as they pressed forward in the rush,
and their yells rent the very roof.

They had hoped for treasure,--they saw but a handful of white-robed
unarmed men, standing around one taller than the rest; and in the
throng they saw two women. Their rage knew no bounds, and their screams
rose more piercing than ever, as they surrounded the doomed band, and
overwhelmed them, and dyed their misshapen blades in the crimson blood
that flowed so red and strong over the fair white vestures.

The priests struggled like brave men to the last. They grasped their
hideous foes by arm and limb and neck, and tossed some of them back upon
their fellows; fighting desperately with their bare hands against the
armed murderers. But the foe were a hundred to one, and the priests fell
in heaps upon each other while the blood flowed out between the feet of
the wild, surging throng, who yelled and slew, and yelled again, as each
priest tottered back and fell, with the death-wound in his breast.

At last, one tall wretch, with bloodied eyes and distorted features,
leaped across a heap of slain and laid hold of Nehushta by the hair with
his reeking hand, and strove to drag her out. But Zoroaster's thin arms
went round her like lightning and clasped her to his breast. Then the
little Syrian maid raised her Indian knife, with both hands, high above
her head, and smote the villain with all her might beneath the fifth
rib, that he died in the very act; but ere he had fallen, a sharp blade
fell swiftly, like a crooked flash of light, and severed the small hands
at the wrist; and the brave, true-hearted little maid fell shrieking to
the floor. One shriek--and that was all; for the same sword smote her
again as she lay, and so she died.

But Nehushta's head fell forward on the high priest's breast, and her
arms clasped him wildly as his clasped her.

"Oh, Zoroaster, my beloved, my beloved! Say not any more that I am
unfaithful, for I have been faithful even unto death, and I shall be
with you beyond the stars for ever!"

He pressed her close