Jez-Riah seemed to read their thoughts. “No, harden not your hearts against me, for I can help you,” said she earnestly. “Why have you sought us?” asked Alan, this time less curtly. “I know a road in here—a secret road, said to be a thousand and ten miles long; a stream of unknown depths, races along by the side of it—a stream that is swifter by far than the fastest of waters—there,” and she pointed in the direction from which she had come. “It leads to the tomb of Korah, so they say, but torture was threatened to all who would have ventured in search of it. O Ar-lane, you know not what our tortures are.” “I have seen some,” said Alan grimly. Jez-Riah laughed. “Nay, Ar-lane—you have never seen what I have seen. You have never witnessed the Curse of Fire.” As she spoke her eyes grew big and her expression distorted as she lived again the scenes she had so often witnessed. “I have seen men roasted alive. I have seen acid juices poured on the sufferers’ wounds. I have seen—” but Alan stopped her. “Enough!” he cried. “It’s horrible.” She continued. “But tortures even worse were threatened for those who would seek the tomb of Korah. So none tried. I knew you would be safe for a while in these caves—but I knew too, that with some one to guide you, you might go farther even than you dared hope. I am weary of my life, I am an eighth child of a priestess of the direct line of Bin-Nab; but I have the blood of the living in my veins. I want to live the life of the People of the Sun—your people. That is the reason I cast my veil from me, O Men of the Outer World, and sought you. Oh cast not Jez-Riah from thee, but keep her as thy slave, for she will by of much use to thee.” Jez-Riah had cast herself at the boys’ feet, and her tears and sobs were coming fast. Desmond and Alan felt strangely moved at the sight of this woman, so different from the women they were used to in the world above. “I don’t think it’s trickery, Alan, do you?” said Desmond. In his heart Alan believed in the truth of the strange woman’s story, yet he knew from past experience that it was impossible to believe the inhabitants of the underworld. He looked Jez-Riah up and down. “Any weapons?” he asked suddenly. Jez-Riah held up her head proudly and her eyes flashed fire and she stamped her foot. “I come ‘feula-ri!’ Is it likely I am traitor, O Men who Doubt?” Now the boys knew enough of the customs of the strange world in which they found themselves, that if the sacred word “feula-ri—” was spoken, no treachery was contemplated; for that word meant more to them than does the white man’s flag of truce. For in times of war, has not even the white flag been violated?