At length Lah pushed aside a heavy curtain, and we stood, still hand in hand, within the Burial Hall of Kings. You have heard already Lestrade’s account of this same fearsome sepulchre. Now to his word I add my own, for as I am a living man, thus I, too, crossed the threshold of that awful place and stood within.
The dead Kings stirred not as we came; neither spoke they word of welcome. But had they risen one and all to repel the stranger whose footfall thus boldly broke the peace of centuries, I should still have been unsurprised and unafraid. For it was of the ruby, and of the ruby alone, that I thought, and so I put forth no claim to bravery, other than is natural to me, but relate the simple truth of what then followed.
Without pausing, Lah drew me forward until we reached the single empty throne, and there, by a sign, she bade me sit. So, at her command, I, a living man, as yet uncrowned, took my place with these, the monarchs of the past. Then, with averted face, the Queen withdrew, and I, save for the awful presence of the dead, was quite alone.
A curious drowsiness clouded my brain and lulled to rest my every sense. I thought the ruby’s fire scorched my flesh, and the pain of it was not all pain, but pleasure, too, intermingled in a way of which I now find it hard to rightly tell, though to this day I bear upon my breast a scar which up to that strange hour was not there.
Thus for a time I sat, and then the dead King at my right spoke, though his lips moved not, and his words fell coldly on the silence.
“O my brethren, the hour is at hand; the curse is fallen. The glory of Edba and of Hed is darkened, and our bodies, reverenced throughout the ages, shall crumble to dust, and be scattered through the world by every varying wind. A woman hath wrought great things for the Walled City. A woman shall pluck down even that which she hath set up. Speak, O my brothers! What price shall the stranger pay?”
Then a low, wrathful murmur filled that ancient Hall, to which I, still gloating over my treasure, my ruby without price, listened without fear.
“He shall taste of love and die athirst,” said one.
“He shall hold in the hollow of his hand great wealth, and behold it shall avail him not,” answered a third.
“Woe! woe!” cried another; “Death shall stay from him afar off. The weariness of years and the coldness of friends be his portion.”