‘Fire!’ Talen yelled.
‘Fire!’ the rest echoed.
In the street below, the church soldiers came pounding around the corner to be met by the nearly hysterical owner of the stables. ‘Good masters!’ the poor man cried, wringing his hands. ‘My stable! My horses! My house! My God!’
The officious captain hesitated, looking first at the fire then back at the looming wall of the chapterhouse in an agony of indecision.
‘We’ll help you, Captain,’ Tynian called down from the wall. ‘Open the gate!’
‘No!’ the captain shouted back. ‘Stay inside.’
‘You could lose half of the holy city, you blockhead!’ Kalten roared at him. ‘That fire will spread if you don’t do something immediately.’
‘You!’ the captain snapped at the commoner who owned the stable. ‘Fetch buckets and show me the nearest well.’ He turned quickly to his men. ‘Form up a line,’ he commanded. ‘Go to the front gate of the Pandion house and bring back every man we can spare.’ He sounded decisive now. Then he squinted up at the knights on the parapet. ‘But leave a detachment on guard there,’ he ordered.
‘We can still help, Captain,’ Tynian offered. ‘There’s a deep well here. We can turn out our men and pass buckets to your men outside the gate. Our major concern here must be the saving of Chyrellos. Everything else must be secondary to that.’
The captain hesitated.
‘Please, Captain!’ Tynian’s voice throbbed with sincerity. ‘I beg of you. Let us help.’
‘Very well,’ the captain snapped. ‘Open your gate. But no one is to leave the chapterhouse grounds.’
‘Of course not,’ Tynian replied.
‘Nicely done,’ Ulath grunted, tapping Tynian on the shoulder with his fist.
Tynian grinned at him. ‘Talking does pay off sometimes, my silent friend. You should try it sometime.’
‘I’d rather use an axe.’
‘Well, I guess I’ll be leaving now, my Lords,’ Talen said. ‘Was there anything you’d like to have me pick up for you – since I’ll be out and about anyway?’
‘Keep your mind on what you’re supposed to do,’ Sparhawk told him. ‘Just go and talk to Dolmant.’
‘And be careful,’ Kurik growled. ‘You’re a disappointing son sometimes, but I don’t want to lose you.’
‘Sentimentality, father?’ Talen said, affecting surprise.
‘Not really,’ Kurik replied. ‘Just a certain sense of responsibility to your mother.’
‘I’ll go with him,’ Berit said.
Talen looked critically at the rangy novice. ‘Forget it,’ he said shortly. ‘You’d just be in my way. Forgive me, revered teacher, but your feet are too big and your elbows stick out too far to move around quietly, and I don’t have time to teach you how to sneak right now.’ The boy disappeared into the shadows along the parapet.
‘Where did you find that rare youth?’ Bevier asked.
‘You wouldn’t believe it, Bevier,’ Kalten replied. ‘You absolutely wouldn’t believe it.’
‘Our Pandion brothers are perhaps a bit more worldly than the rest of us, Bevier,’ Tynian said sententiously. ‘We who fix our eyes firmly on heaven are not so versed in the seamier side of life as they are.’ He looked piously at Kalten. ‘We all serve, however, and I’m sure that God appreciates your efforts, no matter how dishonest or depraved.’
‘Well put,’ Ulath said with an absolutely straight face.
The fire in the thatched roof continued to smoke and steam as the church soldiers threw bucket after bucket of water onto it during the next quarter of an hour. Gradually, by sheer dint of numbers and the volume of water poured on it, the fire was quenched, leaving the owner of the stable bemoaning the saturation of his store of fodder, but preventing any spread of the flames.
‘Bravo, Captain, bravo!’ Tynian cheered from atop the wall.
‘Don’t overdo it,’ Ulath muttered to him.
‘It’s the first time I’ve ever seen any of those fellows do anything useful,’ Tynian protested. ‘That sort of thing ought to be encouraged.’
‘We could start some more fires, if you’d like,’ the huge Genidian offered. ‘We could keep them hauling water all week.’
Tynian tugged at one earlobe. ‘No,’ he said after a moment’s thought. ‘They might get bored when the novelty wears off and decide to let the city burn.’ He glanced at Kurik. ‘Did the boy get away?’ he asked.
‘As slick as a snake going down a rat hole,’ Sparhawk’s squire replied, trying to conceal the note of pride in his voice.
‘Someday you’ll have to tell us about why the lad keeps calling you “father”.’
‘We might get to that one day, my Lord Tynian,’ Kurik muttered.
As the first light of dawn crept up the eastern sky, there came the measured tread of hundreds of feet some distance up the narrow street outside the front gate of the chapterhouse. Then the Patriarch Dolmant, astride a white mule, came into view at the head of a battalion or more of red-liveried soldiers.
‘Your Grace,’ the soot-smeared captain who had been blocking the gate of the chapterhouse exclaimed, rushing forward with a salute.
‘You are relieved, Captain,’ Dolmant told him. ‘You may return with your men to your barracks.’ He sniffed a bit disapprovingly. ‘Tell them to clean up,’ he suggested. ‘They look like chimney sweeps.’
‘Your Grace,’ the captain faltered, ‘I was commanded by the Patriarch of Coombe to secure this house. May I send to him for confirmation of your Grace’s counter-order?’
Dolmant considered it. ‘No, Captain,’ he said. ‘I don’t think so. Retire at once.’
‘But, your Grace!’
Dolmant slapped his hands sharply together, and the troops massed at his back moved into position, their pikes advanced. ‘Colonel,’ Dolmant said in the mildest of tones to the commander of his troops, ‘would you be so good as to escort the captain and his men back to their barracks?’
‘At once, your Grace,’ the officer replied with a sharp salute.
‘And I think they should be confined there until they are presentable.’
‘Of course, your Grace,’ the colonel said soberly. ‘I myself shall conduct the inspection.’
‘Meticulously, Colonel – most meticulously. The honour of the Church is reflected in the appearance of her soldiers.’
‘Your Grace may rely upon my attention to the most minute detail,’ the colonel assured him. ‘The honour of our service is also reflected by the appearance of our lowliest soldier.’
‘God appreciates your devotion, Colonel.’
‘I live but to serve Him, your Grace.’ The colonel bowed deeply.
