"I am merely their interpreter!"
She looked at him steadfastly as if pondering his words.
"And you profess to be able to release the soul from its abode of clay?"
"I do not profess," he said quietly. "I can do so!"
"And with the success of this experiment your power ceases? You cannot tell whether the imprisoned creature will take its course to the netherworld of suffering, or a heaven of delight?"
"The liberated soul must shift for itself."
"Then begin your incantations," Theodora exclaimed recklessly. "Send me, no matter where, so long as I escape from this den of the world, this dungeon with one small window through which, with the death rattle in our throats, we stare vacantly at the blank, unmeaning horror of life. Prove to me that the soul you prattle of exists, and if mine can find its way straight to the mainsprings of this revolving creation, it shall cling to the accursed wheels and stop them, that they may grind out the torture of life no more."
She stood there, dark, defiant, beautiful with the beauty of the fallen angel. Her breath came and went quickly. She seemed to challenge some invisible opponent.
The tall sinewy form by her side watched her as a physician might watch in his patient the workings of a new disease, then Hormazd said in low and tranquil tones:
"You are in the throes of your own overworked emotions. You are seeking to obtain the impossible—"