"Love me, Tarzan!" she cried. "Love me, and you shall be saved."

Tarzan's bonds hurt him. He was suffering the tortures of
long-restricted circulation. With an angry growl he rolled over
with his back toward La. That was her answer! The High Priestess
leaped to her feet. A hot flush of shame mantled her cheek and
then she went dead white and stepped to the shelter's entrance.

"Come, Priests of the Flaming God!" she cried, "and make ready the
sacrifice."

The warped things advanced and entered the shelter. They laid hands
upon Tarzan and bore him forth, and as they chanted they kept time
with their crooked bodies, swaying to and fro to the rhythm of
their song of blood and death. Behind them came La, swaying too;
but not in unison with the chanted cadence. White and drawn was
the face of the High Priestess--white and drawn with unrequited
love and hideous terror of the moments to come. Yet stern in
her resolve was La. The infidel should die! The scorner of her
love should pay the price upon the fiery altar. She saw them lay
the perfect body there upon the rough branches. She saw the High
Priest, he to whom custom would unite her--bent, crooked, gnarled,
stunted, hideous--advance with the flaming torch and stand awaiting
her command to apply it to the faggots surrounding the sacrificial
pyre. His hairy, bestial face was distorted in a yellow-fanged
grin of anticipatory enjoyment. His hands were cupped to receive
the life blood of the victim--the red nectar that at Opar would
have filled the golden sacrificial goblets.