"Forgive my agitation when you first entered, hiziren, but it brought to mind the doom-filled phrases of what we of Savissa call the Prophecy of Jeddah-Khana."
"What is that?"
"It is a very old prophecy, carved in an ancient runic script on the stone walls of one of the vaults under this tower. Tradition says it was put there by the Old Ones who built this city, and of whose science we are the unworthy heirs." Rupin-Sang bowed and touched his forehead as he mentioned the Old Ones. "The Prophecy states that the day will come when a red-skinned man and a dark-haired woman and a ruddy, bearded giant will come together to the city from afar, and that within a month thereafter the Golden City of Larr will crumble and return to the dust."
"But surely you don't take such old legends seriously!" Gerry said. The old man smiled.
"My head tells me not to, but superstition is strong in we of Savissa. However—I can take comfort from the fact that the old legend also prophecies a re-birth for Savissa after the great catastrophe. But enough of this talk of portents and legends! I give you welcome to Savissa, and to the city of Larr. Also, I thank you for rescuing my youngest daughter from the Scaly Raiders. Whence come ye?"
Gerry sketched in hasty phrases the outline of present conditions on Earth and Mars, and told of their trip through space to Venus in the Viking. Rupin-Sang nodded without showing any particular surprise.
"And so that's the story," Gerry concluded. "We're curious about some of your conditions here. The women warriors, for instance...."
"It was not always so in the land of Savissa," Rupin-Sang said with a faint smile. "In the days of the Old Ones there was a natural balance of the sexes. But, as the slow centuries passed, the birth rate gradually changed. Now one child in five thousand born in Savissa is a male. The few men we do have are needed for certain administrative and scientific work, particularly the supervision of the alta-radium mines in the mountains from which we get the raw material for the alta-ray tubes that are our greatest protection against invasion."
"I saw the tubes on the walls," Gerry said, "but why is it that your mobile forces are armed only with primitive weapons like bows and arrows?"
"Because we cannot possibly mine and produce enough of the alta-radium to do more than supply the defences of the city and of the barrier forts. The possession of the secret of that ray has kept our borders free from the Scaly Ones except for isolated raids like the one you encountered today, but we cannot arm our troops with the ray."