astonishment. She-who-commands, She-who-is-everlasting
!
It occurred to me that this must be some Arabic idiom for the Eternal Feminine, but I only looked vague and said,
It would appear that there are some whom this exalted, everlasting She cannot command; those who attacked us; also those who have fled away yonder,
and I waved my hand towards the mountain.
No command is absolute; in every country there are rebels, even, as I have heard, in Heaven above us. But, Wanderer, what is your name?
Watcher-by-Night,
I answered.
Ah! a good name for one who must have watched well by night, and by day too, to reach this country living where She-who-commands says that no man of your colour has set foot for many generations. Indeed, I think she told me once that two thousand years had gone by since she spoke to a white man in the City of Kôr.
Did she indeed?
I exclaimed, stifling a cough.
You do not believe me,
he went on, smiling. Well, She-who-commands can explain matters for herself better than I who was not alive two thousand years ago, so far as I remember. But what must I call him with the Axe?
Warrior is his name.
Again a good name, as to judge by the wounds on them, certain of those rebels I think are now telling each other in Hell. And this man, if indeed he be a man—
he added, looking doubtfully at Hans.
Light-in-Darkness is his name.
I see, doubtless because his colour is that of the winter sun in thick fog, or a bad egg broken into milk. And the other white man who mutters and whose brow is like a storm?
He is called Avenger; you will learn why later on,
I answered impatiently, for I grew tired of this catechism, adding, And what are you called and, if you are pleased to tell it to us, upon what errand do you visit us in so fortunate an hour?
I am named Billali,
he answered, the servant and messenger of She-who-commands, and I was sent to save you and to bring you safely to her.
How can this be, Billali, seeing that none knew of our coming?
