"What about danger to you ?" She smiled, her little pearl-white teeth gleaming in the moonlight, as she spoke: "There is no danger for me.

I am safe.

I am the safest person, perhaps the only safe person, in all this land." The full significance of her words did not seem to come to me all at once.

Some base for understanding such an assertion seemed to be wanting.

It was not that I did not trust or believe her, but that I thought she might be mistaken.
I wanted to reassure myself, so in my distress I asked unthinkingly: "How the safest?
What is your protection ?" For several moments that spun themselves out endlessly she looked me straight in the face, the stars in her eyes seeming to glow like fire; then, lowering her head, she took a fold of her shroud and held it up to me.
"This!" The meaning was complete and understandable now.