for hope has died and yet there is the possibility that among so many fighting men, even though they be of another race than mine, there is one who would accord honorable treatment to a stranger within his gates—even though she be a woman."
Ja-don looked at her for a long minute. "Ko-tan would make you his queen," he said. "That he told me himself and surely that were honorable treatment from one who might make you a slave."
"Why, then, would he make me queen?" she asked.
Ja-don came closer as though in fear his words might be overheard. "He believes, although he did not tell me so in fact, that you are of the race of gods. And why not? Jad-ben-Otho is tailless, therefore it is not strange that Ko-tan should suspect that only the gods are thus. His queen is dead leaving only a single daughter. He craves a son and what more desirable than that he should found a line of rulers for Pal-ul-don descended from the gods?"
"But I am already wed," cried Jane. "I cannot wed another. I do not want him or his throne."
"Ko-tan is king," replied Ja-don simply as though that explained and simplified everything.
"You will not save me then?" she asked.
"If you were in Ja-lur," he replied, "I might protect you, even against the king."
