Alaric left the room as soon as Cora and the maidens departed after promising to deal with Mariah. He entered a room where servants were busy preparing the table with various types of meals. They all knelt upon seeing him, greeting him respectfully. He walked ahead and sat on the mat with a pillow at the head of the table. As soon as he settled down, several people dressed in beautiful robes of different colors entered. Maximus was among them, clad in a white robe fastened with a purple sash, underneath a purple overcoat with a white hemline. Others were dressed in yellow, green, red, white, and the last one was blue. They all knelt and greeted him before seating themselves on the mats arranged around the table. All the mats had sitting pillows on them.
The man dressed in a white robe und
