Caris shuddered as he heard.
'I love you,' he stammered. 'Do not hate me—for pity's sake, do not hate me.'
'Obey me, then,' she said, with her dark level brows contracting over her luminous eyes.
'In anything else!'
'Oh, ay! It is always anything else, except the one thing which is wanted!'
'But what is it you want?'
'I want the charms and the wand and the book out of your mother's grave.'
'What could you do with them? Without the knowledge, they are no more than a dry twig and a few dirty play-cards.'
'How know you what knowledge I have? I want the things, that is all, I tell you.'
'They were accursed if they had any use in them. And what use had they? She who understood them lived and died all but a beggar. If they had any power in them, they cheated and starved her.'