“So?” Gavin asked, holding the tube.

“So I do not want to speak my plans aloud, brother. For various reasons.” He pursed his lips. “Read the scroll and give it to Tom and Michael, and then bring it back here so I can make it ash.”

Drawn like a moth to a flame, Gavin was already reading. He whistled, and raised his head. “Holy Mary mother of God,” he said in shock. “Who else knows this?”

“Gelfred. Ranald. Kronmir.” Gabriel shrugged. “To be honest, none of you know everything I know.”

“You are so trusting,” Gavin said.

“If I go down, it’s yours,” Gabriel said.

“You almost died, didn’t you?” Gavin said.

“I should be dead, right now,” Gabriel said.

Bad Tom, missing his cousin’s calm efficiency, divided his herds in the fields south of Albinkirk. A flurry of messengers found him an Etruscan factor and one of Ser Gerald Random’s company clerks, and between them they took financial responsibility for a third of the herd and hired, on the spot, twenty of the captain’s men-at-arms, hurriedly placed under Sauce and Ser Gavin, and rode away west to the fair at Lissen Carak.

Bad Tom fretted at the delay, but he had no choice. So he read the scroll that Ser Michael handed him, grinned at the captain’s former squire, and handed it back. He drank off a stiff cup of wine and looked at Ser Michael.

“I’m sending Kaitlin to Lissen Carak,” Ser Michael said.

Bad Tom poured a second cup. “He almost died, and I wasn’t there,” he said suddenly.

Ser Michael nodded. “Me, either.”

Tom met the other knight’s eye. They were suddenly within a finger’s breadth of being of a height. “I don’t want to be somewhere else when he goes down. I want to be in the shield ring. I want to swing the last blow over his corpse. I want the sword women to take me with him when they go.”

“You’re not exactly a Christian, are you, Tom?” Michael asked.

Tom gulped wine. Very quietly, he said, “Have you read yon?”

Michael nodded.

“Tar’s tits,” Tom said.

Michael considered that for a long time. Then he smiled. “Yes,” he said, and went to spend a few last hours with his wife.

Kaitlin was her usual self—buoyant and undemanding and centred on the needs of others. She wanted Michael to take her to the captain, but Michael was against it and, besides, he knew that Ser Gavin was riding in the morning. “Let the captain sleep,” he said. “You can see him in the morning, when we bury the priest and the children.” His voice was rough with forced nonchalance.