“Oh, are they in the house—now?” She almost sobbed with relief.
“I saw them both only an hour ago.”
“Oh, but within the hour they are gone far. Dryas to Athens, Lycophron to Thermopylæ. Father, search the house. Send after them quick, quick.” She seized both his shoulders, shaking them as if to waken him to the sorrow.
“Where did you get this information?” Nikander was pitiful of her strange mistake.
“I cannot tell you. It came, it came.” Her eyes looked so strange and glittering, her whole aspect so bordering on delirium or even ecstasy, that Nikander touched her gently.
“Was it by some prophetic power?—vision?”
Theria was so upwrought that she spoke out her first instinctive thought.
“No—no prophecy. Do not speak of prophecy. I am not deceiving. This is real, real.”
The words escaped the door of her lips. She was aghast at the net of lies closing about her. Of course if she should tell her father it was prophecy he would believe. But she would not lie to him, not even——