‘Precisely’ Sparhawk turned once more to the abbot. ‘My Lord,’ he said, ‘do you have any way to get messages to Preceptor Abriel at your motherhouse in Larium? Messages that can’t be intercepted?’

The abbot gave him a frosty stare

‘We agreed to be frank with each other, my Lord,’ Sparhawk reminded him. ‘I’m not trying to embarrass you, but this is a matter of the greatest urgency.’

‘All right, Sparhawk,’ the abbot replied a bit stiffly. ‘Yes, I can get a message to Lord Abriel.’

‘Good. Sephrenia knows all the details and she can fill you in. Kurik and I have something to attend to.’

‘Just what are you planning?’ the abbot demanded.

‘I’m going to pay a call on Elius. He knows what’s been going on, and I think I can persuade him to share the information. We need confirmation of all this before you send the message to Larium.’

‘It’s too dangerous.’

‘Not as dangerous as having Annias in the Archprelacy, is It?’ Sparhawk considered it. ‘Do you happen to have a secure cell someplace?’ he asked.

‘We have a penitent’s cell down in the cellar. The door can be locked, I suppose.’

‘Good. I think we’ll bring Elius back here to question him. Then you can lock him up. I can’t let him go, once he knows I’m here, and Sephrenia disapproves of random murders. If he just disappears, there’ll be some un-certainty about what happened to him.’

‘Won’t he make an outcry when you take him captive?’

‘Not very likely, my Lord,’ Kurik assured him, drawing his heavy dagger. He slapped the hilt solidly against his palm. ‘I can practically guarantee that he’ll be asleep.’

The streets were quiet. The overcast which had obscured the sky that afternoon had cleared, and the stars were very bright overhead.

‘No moon,’ Kurik said quietly as he and Sparhawk crept through the deserted streets. ‘That’s a help.’

‘It’s been rising late the past three nights,’ Sparhawk said.

‘How late?’

‘We’ve got a couple more hours.’

‘Can we make it back to the monastery by then?’

‘We have to.’ Sparhawk stopped just before they reached an intersection and peered around the corner of a house. A man wearing a short cape and carrying a spear and a small lantern was shuffling sleepily along the street. ‘Watchman,’ Sparhawk breathed, and he and Kurik stepped into the shadows of a deeply recessed doorway

The watchman plodded on past, the lantern swinging from his hand casting looming shadows against the walls of the buildings.

‘He should be more alert,’ Kurik growled disapprovingly.

‘Under the circumstances your sense of what’s proper might be a little misplaced.’

‘Right is right, Sparhawk,’ Kurik replied stubbornly. After the watchman was out of sight, they crept on up the street.

‘Are we just going to walk up to the gate of the consulate?’ Kurik asked.