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Then I went down through the hall and lighted a lantern and went into the little chamber where, as before, I changed my clothing for the imperial robes, and set the Llautu on my head; but I kept on my belt under my cloak, and put two revolvers in it in case I should need them, and when I went back into the hall Tupac and the others were lighting candles and putting them in the holders round the walls as I had bidden them.
Round his head was wreathed a turban of many-colored folds, called the llautu; and a tasselled fringe, like that worn by the prince, but of a scarlet color, with two feathers of a rare and curious bird, called the coraquenque, placed upright in it, were the distinguishing insignia of royalty.
This one I took, and went with it into the passage where I had left my lantern. Then I dashed it against the wall and vanished into the darkness. I took my lantern, and hiding the light carefully, went back to the little chamber, where I took off my robes and sandals and the imperial Llautu, and put them back into the chest. Then I put on my mean attire again and went back into the Hall of Gold.
And now a wondrous thing happened. As I stood there facing the prostrate throng, lowering the Llautu on to my head, I heard a low, sharp cry beside me on my right hand. I turned half round, and there I saw Golden Star staring at me with eyes burning with the light that shone through them from her new-awakened soul.
As we approached the streets, great crowds of my delivered people thronged out to welcome us, and when they saw me riding on my black horse, dressed in the imperial robes and with the Llautu on my brow, they set up a shout of joy and welcome that went ringing along the streets and through the squares and all over the city, and so I rode on through the bareheaded throngs, who bowed themselves almost to the earth before me.
Our talk, as you may well believe, was of war and not of love, though it would be hard to say which of the two at that hour most filled our secret thoughts; but, as I have told you, this English soldier was a true man, and I trusted him, knowing well that though, when the imperial Llautu once more encircled my brows, I might find courage to seek openly the love of her into whose eyes I had already seen him look with love, yet no falsehood or hatred could ever come between us.
Then, binding the golden sandals on my feet, and clasping the long mantle emblazoned in gold and jewels with the symbols of the Sun and his sister-wife the Moon across my shoulders, I wound the scarlet Llautu around my head, with the crimson fringe of the Borla interlaced with gold falling upon my brow, and then, closing the chest, I took up my lantern and went back along the passages I had traversed.
What he had done was an act of homage, which, in the olden time, was paid only to him who wore the imperial Llautu, and proved to me how faithfully the old traditions had been preserved in secret. 'That is well said, Tupac, I replied, speaking now as a sovereign might speak to a faithful subject, 'and in the days to come fear not that I shall forget this, your first act of unasked-for homage.
Her hands were clasped to her temples, pushing back her thick, bright hair from her forehead. Her face was flushed, and her half-open lips were working as though they were striving to shape some long-forgotten words. At the instant that the Llautu touched my brows, she rose to her feet.
Then I lifted up my voice and spoke the ancient Invocation to the Sun which generation after generation of my fathers had spoken from the same spot at the beginning of the feast of Raymi, and when I had ended this the Children of the Blood lifted up their voices after me and sang the long-silenced and yet never-forgotten hymn to the Sun, and then, standing before the kneeling multitude, I replaced the Llautu on my brow and proclaimed myself Inca and supreme Lord of the Land of the Four Regions in the name of my long-dead fathers, whose divine right to lordship had been preserved in me.
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