Her snowy face was cold, impassive. Even when she slightly raised her right hand to us in salutation, not the slightest change was perceptible upon it.
The next moment, however, there was a change—when she addressed Drorathusa. For each of the others Lepraylya had a kind word, and then we all moved back a few steps to the seats which had been reserved for us—all save Drorathusa. She, we at once perceived, was about to give an account of the journey up to the mysterious, the awful world above. There was not a vacant seat in all that great room, save one—that for Drorathusa. This was to the left of the throne, as one faces it, together with a dozen or so others, all occupied by persons whom I at once, and rightly, set down as priests and priestesses.
Of this small group (small but most powerful) every member save one was dressed in a robe of snowy white. As for the individual in question, his robe was of the deepest purple, and he had round his head a deep-blue fillet, in which was set a large gem, a diamond, as we afterward learned, of a red so strange and somber that one could not help thinking of blood and weird, dreadful things. We thought that this personage was the high priest, and in this we were not mistaken. He was about sixty years of age, lean to emaciation and with the cold, hard look of the fanatic in his eyes and, indeed, in his every lineament. His face, smooth-shaven, as is the Droman custom, was like that of some cruel bird of prey. Coldly had he received, and returned, the salutation of Drorathusa, and dark with malevolence had been the look which he had fixed upon Rhodes and me.
There could not be the slightest doubt that this human raptor purposed to rend us beak and talon.
Chapter 41
He Strikes
Drorathusa began her story. Lepraylya leaned forward, rested her chin on her left hand and listened with the most careful attention. So still were the listeners that, as the saying has it, you could, anywhere in that great hall, have heard a pin drop.
At times, so expressive were her gestures, Rhodes and I had no difficulty whatever in following Drorathusa; but only at times. I have, however, had access to a transcript of the stenographic record of her story (the Dromans, despite the remarkable polysyllabic character of their language, have most excellent tachygraphers) and wish that space would permit inclusion of it here.
When Drorathusa had finished, the queen (who had several times interrupted with some interrogation) put a number of questions. With two or three exceptions, the answers given by our Sibyl seemed to be satisfactory. But those exceptions gave us something to think about. It was obvious that the queen was troubled not a little by those answers; and she was not, I believed, a woman who would lightly suffer the mask to reveal her thoughts or her feelings.
When the queen had done, came the turn of that high priest, whose name was Brendaldoombro. Up he rose and addressed a few words to Lathendra Lepraylya. Her answer was laconic, accompanied by an assenting motion of her right hand. For a few seconds her look rested upon Rhodes and me, and it was as though across those strange, wondrous pale eyes of hers a shadow had fallen.
As for the high priest, he had instantly, and with a fierceness that he could not bridle, turned to Drorathusa.
