“What a man may do, I have done to save your Majesty.  Now I go to make report to Pharaoh, leaving you in charge of Amen, who shall protect you, and to Rames, my son, the heritage of vengeance.  Farewell, O Daughter of Amen, till I see your star rise in the darkness of the Under-World, and to you, beloved wife, farewell.”

Then, uttering the war-cry of his fathers, those Pharaohs who once had ruled in Egypt, the tall and noble Mermes grasped his sword in both his hands, and rushed upon the advancing foe, slaying and slaying until he himself was slain.

“Come with me, O Wife of a royal hero,” said Tua to Asti, who had covered her eyes with her hand, and was leaning against the wall.

“Widow, not wife, Queen.  Did you not see his spirit pass?”

Then Tua led her up more steps to the top of the pylon tower, where Asti sank down moaning in her misery.  Tua walked to the outermost edge of the tower and stood there waiting the end.  It was the moment of dawn.  On the eastern horizon the red rim of the sun arose out of the desert in a clear sky.  There upon that lofty pinnacle, clad in shining mail, and wearing a helm shaped like the crown of Lower Egypt, Tua stood in its glorious rays that turned her to a figure of fire set above a world of shadow.  The thousands of the people watching from the streets below, and from boats upon the Nile, saw her, and raised a shout of wonder and of adoration.

“The Daughter of Amen-Ra!” they cried.  “Behold her clad in the glory of the god!”

Soldiers crept up the stairs to the pylon roof and saw her also, while, now that the fray was ended, with them came the Prince Abi.

“Seize her,” he panted, for the stairs were steep and robbed him of his breath.

But the soldiers looked and shrank back before the Majesty of Egypt, wrapped in her robe of light.

“We fear,” they answered, “the ghost of Pharaoh stands before her.”

Then Neter-Tua spoke, saying: 

“Abi, once a Prince of Egypt and Hereditary Lord of Memphis, but now an outcast murderer, black with the blood of your King, and of many a loyal man, hear me, the anointed Queen of Egypt, hear me, O man upon whom I decree the judgment of the first and second death.  Come but one step near to my Majesty, and before your eyes, and the eyes of all the multitude who watch, I hurl myself from this hideous place into the waters of the Nile.  Yet ere I go to join dead Pharaoh, and side by side with him to lay our plaint against you before the eternal gods, listen to our curse upon you.  From this day forward a snake shall prey upon your vitals, gnawing upwards to your heart.  The spirits of Pharaoh and of all his servants whom you have slain shall haunt your sleep; never shall you know one more hour of happy rest.  Through life henceforth you shall fly from a shadow, and if you climb a throne, it shall be such a one as that on which I stand encircled with the perilous depths of darkness.  Thence you shall fall at last, dying by a death of shame, and the evil gods shall seize upon you, O Traitor, and drag you to the maw of the Eater-up of Souls, and therein you shall vanish for ever for aye, you and all your House, and all those who cling to you.  Thus saith Neter-Tua, speaking with the voice of Amen who created her, her father and the god of gods.”