As she lay among her cushions, dreading the end of the journey, but gradually wearying of the future, her thoughts went back to the first cause of all her misfortunes, of Michael Rhangabé's awful death, of all the suffering that had followed them. One man alone had wrought that evil and much more, one man, the reigning Emperor Andronicus. Zoë was not revengeful, not cruel, very far from bloodthirsty; but when she thought of him she felt that she would kill him if she could, and that it would only be justice. Suddenly a ray of something like hope flashed through her darkness. Nectaria had told her how beautiful she was; perhaps, being so much more valuable than most of the slaves that went to the market, she might be destined for the Emperor himself. It was just possible. She set her teeth and clenched her little hands in the dark. If that should be her fate, the usurper's days were numbered. She would free her country from its tyrant and be revenged for Rhangabé's murder and for all the rest at one quick stroke, though she might be condemned to die within the hour. That was indeed something to hope for.
The litter stopped and she heard keys thrust into locks, and felt that the porters turned short to the left to enter a door. Her journey through the city was at an end.
Rustan stayed behind to shut the outer door, and Zoë felt that she was carried as much as twenty paces forward and upwards before the bearers stood still at last. Then the sliding panel opened, letting in light, and a strange voice told her to get out. She turned inside the palanquin and thrust out her naked feet. As she put them down, expecting to touch bare earth or a stone pavement, they rested on a rough carpet; at the same instant she sat on the edge of the litter bending her head to get out of it and looking round curiously.
Rustan was not there, and in his place she saw a huge young negress with flaming red hair and rolling eyes, who roughly ordered the porters to take away the palanquin and at the same time caught Zoë's wrist, whether to help her to stand upright or to secure her person it was hard to say. The girl was much more fearless than Omobono, the Venetian secretary, and she was not frightened by the gigantic woman's appearance, as he had been. In getting out she had managed to gather the cloak round her, so that the men should not see her in her rags; for there was light in the large room where she found herself, and now that she could look about her she saw a dozen or more girls and young women standing in small groups a few paces behind the negress. They surveyed the new arrival curiously, but with different expressions. Some seemed to pity her, others smiled as if to welcome her; one good-looking girl had noticed that she had no shoes, and her lip curled contemptuously at such a proof of abject poverty, for she herself was the daughter of a prosperous Caucasian horse-thief who had brought her up in plenty and ease in order that she might fetch a high price. The bearers had now left the room and there were no men present. Zoë vaguely wished that they would come back, even the black bearers of the litter, for she felt a very womanly woman's distrust of her own sex, where so many who were strangers, and possibly not well-disposed to her, were gathered together to look at her.