“Holy St. Brigid!” gasped Larry.

From the rift in the tunnel’s continuation, nigh a mile beyond the cleft through which we had fled, lifted a crown of horns⁠—of tentacles⁠—erect, alert, of mottled gold and crimson; lifted higher⁠—and from a monstrous scarlet head beneath them blazed two enormous, obloid eyes, their depths wells of purplish phosphorescence; higher still⁠—noseless, earless, chinless; a livid, worm mouth from which a slender scarlet tongue leaped like playing flames! Slowly it rose⁠—its mighty neck cuirassed with gold and scarlet scales from whose polished surfaces the amber light glinted like flakes of fire; and under this neck shimmered something like a palely luminous silvery shield, guarding it. The head of horror mounted⁠—and in the shield’s centre, full ten feet across, glowing, flickering, shining out⁠—coldly, was a rose of white flame, a “flower of cold fire” even as Rador had said.