The Romance of Atlantis Read Free Page A

people. If I know consciousness beyond that dark gulf yawning between us, I shall make every effort to see thee and to guide thy hand. For these are troubled times for our dear Atlantis.”
    With a sigh that was almost a groan, he fell back.
    The doctor picked up the Emperor’s limp wrist. He shook his head with an expression of grief. “The Emperor is no more,” he said. “Long live the Empress.”
    It was not until the Emperor had died that Salustra wept. And then she threw her body over her father’s and sobbed until it was time to carry him away. It was well that she did this, for it was the last time for years she was to know the luxury of tears. As she stood there, she knew not whether she mourned more her father’s passing or the terrible responsibility that was now hers.
    She had pleaded with her father to visit the rejuvenating Temple Beautiful once again, but he had explained it would be to no purpose. “The gods allow no man to live more than two centuries. And it is well, for the gods know more than man.” He had smiled thinly, as she recalled, saying, “When your time comes, daughter, you will better know what I mean.” He had gestured to the heavens. “Who knows but what there is something better on the dark side of the sky, something that gives meaning to our empty pursuit of happiness?”
    She had been too young to grasp the full portent of his words, and saw no reason why life’s benefits should not be expanded indefinitely. As it was, only a favored few among the elite were even considered for Temple Beautiful and the special rays which reactivated the cells and restored the endocrine balance of the glands. Wrinkles disappeared, hair was restored, muscles and circulation renewed, and the years miraculously shorn away, except for what remained in the heart and mind. Lazar had received the rejuvenating rays first when he was seventy-five, and again at one hundred and forty. The second time, he was already tired of life and would have preferred the Unknown. But as yet then he had no heir.
    No woman had ever achieved the Temple Beautiful, for none, until Salustra mounted the throne, had the opportunity to merit this reward. Salustra herself knew of nobody deserving this distinction, except old Mahius, her father’s First Minister, and he soon pleaded for her not to prolong a life already freighted with one rejuvenation experience.
    With tears in his eyes, he had appealed to her better nature. “I deserve better at your hands, Majesty.”
    “Where can I find another like you?” she had rejoined sadly. “Who but you will stand firm with me when the hordes descend from the north?”

2
    How stupid were these men, the Empress thought. For a week now, as a low, swirling mist hung over the land, Atlantis had been in the grip of a mysterious power shortage. Nothing operated by solar or nuclear energy could move—neither vessels of the sea nor land craft nor the ships of the air. All rapid communication via the vibrations of the atmosphere was at a halt, electrical energy was at a standstill, and it seemed as if the very empire must fall apart at the seams. And yet these men, these stupid men, were driveling nonsense for hours, inconsequential nonsense, which not only had no bearing on the present crisis but was also irrelevant to any of the immediate internal and external threats confronting the stricken nation.
    As matters stood now, the Empress had been sitting in Council with the Nobles and Commoners for many hours, and the conversation had been more than usually oppressive. She moved restlessly upon her throne and tapped the floor irritably with a foot. Her eyes idly roamed the Council Chamber, passing from the walls of gleaming white marble to the tremendous soaring columns and the vaulted ceiling, so lofty that the upper pillars were lost in hazy shadows. Her gaze shifted to the center of the vast chamber, where a fountain featured a nymphlike figure holding aloft a torch so brilliant it