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Astounding Stories of Super-Science, August 1930
·
Various
172
CHAPTER
XVI
Cavern
of
the
Cone
The
Gnomes
had
been
bidden
to
take
the
prisoners
to
the
Cavern
of
the
Cone,
but
to
the
surprise
of
Sarka
and
Jaska,
they
were
taken
back
to
the
Place
of
the
Blue
Light!
This
time
the
Gnomes
entered
the
place
with
them,
closing
and
securing
the
door
behind
them.
But
the
Place
of
the
Blue
Light
had
changed!
Now
it
had
no
floor
of
blue,
as
it
had
had
before,
but
only
a
corridor
perhaps
wide
enough
to
allow
the
passage
of
four
grown
men,
walking
side
by
side,
while
the
abyss
of
which
the
two
had
got
but
the
merest
hint
through
the
opening
and
closing
rents
filled
all
the
center
of
the
place!
The
Gnomes
seemed
impervious
to
the
unendurable
heat,
and
these,
moving
together,
one
behind
the
other,
one
beside
the
other,
one
atop
the
other,
formed
a
living
wall
between
Sarka
and
Jaska
and
the
rim
of
the
flaming
blue
abyss,
to
protect
them
from
the
heat.
Yet
through
the
bodies
of
this
living
wall
of
Gnomes,
a
wall
which
was
higher
than
the
heads
of
Sarka
and
Jaska,
the
heat
forced
its
way
to
the
prisoners,
and
burned
them
anew
with
its
agony.
To
what
dread
rendezvous
were
they
going?
Where,
save
for
the
few
guards
at
the
house
of
Luar,
were
the
people
of
the
Gens
of
Dalis?
Sarka
felt,
somehow,
that
the
answers
to
all
these
questions
would
soon
be
made
manifest,
and
a
feeling
of
exaltation
he
could
not
explain
was
possessing
him
as
he
advanced.
Around
the
corridor,
whose
one
side
was
the
wall
reaching
up
to
invisibility,
whose
other
side
dropped
off
into
the
abyss,
the
Gnomes
herded
the
prisoners.
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