‘Our house is closest,’ Vanion told him, ‘and it has its own well. After what happened this morning, I don’t want to give Annias access to our drinking water.’

‘Supplies?’ Darellon asked.

‘We keep enough on hand to withstand a six-month siege,’ Vanion replied. ‘Soldiers’ rations, I’m afraid, Your Grace,’ he apologized to the corpulent Emban.

Emban sighed. ‘Oh, well,’ he said, ‘I’ve been meaning to lose some weight anyway.’

‘It’s a good plan,’ the white-cloaked Preceptor Abriel said, ‘but it does have a drawback. If we’re all in one chapterhouse, the church soldiers can surround us. We’ll be penned up inside with no way to get to the Basilica at all.’

‘Then we’ll fight our way through,’ Komier said, cramming his ogre-horned helmet on his head irritably.

Abriel shook his head. ‘People get killed in fights, Komier. The vote is very close. We can’t afford to lose a single Patriarch at this point.’

‘We can’t win either way,’ Tynian said.

‘I’m not so sure,’ Kalten disagreed.

‘Can you see a way out of it?’

‘I think so.’ Kalten looked at Dolmant. ‘I’ll need permission for this, Your Grace,’ he said.

‘I’m listening. What’s your plan?’

‘If Annias decides to resort to naked force, that means that any semblance of civil order goes out of the window, doesn’t it?’

‘More or less, yes.’

‘Then if he’s not going to pay any attention to the rules, why should we? If we want to cut down on the number of church soldiers surrounding the Pandion chapterhouse, all we have to do is give them something more important to do.’

‘Set fire to the city again?’ Talen suggested.

‘That might be a little extreme,’ Kalten said. ‘We can keep the notion in reserve, though. At this moment, however, the votes Annias has got are the most important things in his life. If we start peeling them off one by one, he’ll do just about anything to protect what he’s got left, won’t he?’

‘I will not allow you to start butchering Patriarchs, Kalten,’ Dolmant said in a shocked voice.

‘We don’t have to kill anybody, Your Grace. All we have to do is imprison a few. Annias is fairly intelligent. He’ll get the point after a while.’

‘You’ll need some kind of charge, Sir Kalten,’ Abriel said. ‘You can’t just imprison Patriarchs of the Church for no reason at all – regardless of the circumstances.’

‘Oh, we have charges, My Lord Abriel – all sorts of charges – but “crimes against the crown of Elenia” has the nicest ring to it, wouldn’t you say?’

‘I hate it when he tries to be clever,’ Sparhawk muttered to Tynian.