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“I have been sitting beside you for half the night, Brother Zacharias. Did you know you talk quite volubly in your sleep? Yet in such a disjointed fashion that I am left puzzled. What can you tell me of Prince Sanglant?”

Almost he blurted out Hathui’s accusations, but he stopped himself. He was helpless and alone. This was not the time to make enemies.Advertisement

“I left the service of Prince Sanglant to become a servant to Brother Marcus. He promised to instruct me in the secrets of the mathematici.”

“Did he do so?”

“He did! He had begun to teach me about the motion of the heavens and the glorious architecture of the world. When I had mastered those, then he promised to teach me how to weave the crowns.”

“Did he!” Hugh glanced toward the unshuttered window but looked back as quickly. “Instead you were stung by a dread creature called an akreva and paralyzed by its venom. Brother Marcus saw fit to send you back to us, as the bearer of a message to the Holy Mother.”

“How came I here? Am I in Darre?”

“Brother Lupus, it seems, had deserted Marcus. He was to bear the message, but in his absence Marcus chose to send you—as you are now—instead. How did it happen that Brother Lupus abandoned his duty?”

“I do not know, Your Excellency.”

“You do not know Brother Lupus?”

“I do not know why he deserted the company, Your Excellency. He fled one night, while we slept in a hostel in Qahirah. That is all I know.”

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“Is that all you know? Truly?”

His gentle smile made Zacharias shudder, and that movement spawned another as his hands spasmed and his feet twitched. It was a warning. If he could survive this paralysis, if it were wearing off, then he might hope to escape. He had no loyalty to Wolfhere, after all.

“We stayed at a hostel where Wolfh—where Brother Lupus had stayed many years before.”

“He traveled in Qahirah before?”

“So he said. I don’t know why. The innkeeper recognized him. He had done the innkeeper a favor many years ago, so we were well treated and given a splendid feast that night and a palatable wine, as much as we could drink. That night I had to rise to use the necessary. When returning to my bed, I happened to overhear a conversation between Brother Marcus and Sister Meriam. Marcus no longer trusted Brother Lupus. He thought Brother Lupus had spent too long in Prince Sanglant’s company and seemed unwilling to return to the fold. Sister Anne had commanded that Brother Lupus be sent back to her once we located the crown which lies beyond the old ruins of Kartiako. It was the next morning that we discovered he was gone. Perhaps he overheard their conversation as well. Perhaps he knew they were suspicious of him, and so he fled.”

“If so, it seems their suspicions were correct. Wolfhere.” He savored the name as he might a sweet wine. “It seems that the king’s distrust of him was deserved.”

So spoke the man who had, according to Hathui, corrupted the king by insinuating a daimone into his body! Zacharias held his tongue. It was all he could do not to blurt out the accusation just to see Hugh’s reaction, but instinct saved him. Hugh was not Bulkezu but something different, better or worse he could not tell.

“Are you a mathematicus?” he asked instead. “Can you teach me now that I no longer travel with Brother Marcus? He promised that I would receive teaching if I joined his cause.”

“Is that your wish, Brother Zacharias? To receive teaching?”

“It is! More than anything!”

“Yet you have not told me what you know of Prince Sanglant. And of an Eagle whose name is Hathui. You spoke her name while you slept. What do you know of her? Is it possible you have seen her? She was once King Henry’s trusted counselor, but rumor has it she murdered Helmut Villam after a lover’s quarrel and fled in disgrace.”

How difficult it was to remain silent! But Zacharias held his tongue. He struggled and writhed in his heart, but he held his tongue.

“A man who brought me information about this Eagle, Hathui, would be accepted as a trustworthy member of my household. Such a man could expect to receive training in any craft his heart desired. Even as a mathematicus. For I am one such. I could take him on as a discipla. I could teach him how to weave the crowns, and much more besides.”

At the price of betraying his sister.

Hadn’t he once said: “I will do anything for the person who will teach me”?

He shut his eyes, and held his tongue, although he knew his silence betrayed him. Where desire and loyalty warred, loyalty won, and he possessed no glib words to worm his way out of this confrontation. He had probably lost the one thing he desired above all else—that he might learn the secrets of the heavens—and yet it mattered not. He had left Hathui behind, but he would never betray her. pqdm.com