Faintly, as from very far away in some hollow place filled with echoes, there came a howl of rage, a howl overlaid with a crackling sound as of some huge fire. The flames dancing along the tops of the oak logs in the fireplace lowered until they were little more than a sickly glimmering. Then they rose, bright yellow and filling the entire opening with a sheet of nearly incandescent fire. Then they froze, no longer a flickering or a dancing but simply a flat, unwavering sheet of motionless yellow. The heat from the fireplace stopped at once as if a pane of thick glass had been set in front of it.

Sparhawk found himself looking into a tent. Martel, drawn and weary-looking, sat at a rough table across from Annias, who looked even worse.

‘Why can’t you find out where they are?’ the Primate of Cimmura was demanding.

‘I don’t know, Annias,’ Martel grated. ‘I’ve called up every creature Otha gave me, and none of them has found anything.’

‘Oh, mighty Pandion,’ Annias sneered. ‘Maybe you should have stayed in your order longer to give Sephrenia time to teach you more than parlour tricks for the amusement of children.’

‘You’re getting very close to the point of outliving your usefulness to me, Annias,’ Martel said ominously. ‘Otha and I can put any Churchman on the Archprelate’s throne and achieve what we want. You’re not really indispensable, you know.’ And that answered the question of just who was taking orders from whom once and for all.

The tent-flap opened, and the ape-like Adus slouched in. His armour was a mismatched accumulation of bits and pieces of rust-splotched steel drawn from a half-dozen different cultures. Adus, Sparhawk noticed again, had no forehead. His hairline began at his shaggy eyebrows. ‘It died,’ he reported in a voice that was half-snarl.

‘I should make you walk, you idiot,’ Martel told him.

‘It was a weak horse,’ Adus shrugged.

‘It was perfectly fine until you spurred it to death. Go and steal another one.’

Adus grinned. ‘A farm horse?’

‘Any kind of horse you can find. Don’t take all night killing the farmer, though – or amusing yourself with his women. And don’t burn the farmstead down. Let’s not light up the sky and announce our location.’

Adus laughed – at least it sounded sort of like a laugh. Then he left the tent.

‘How can you stand that brute?’ Annias shuddered.

‘Adus? He’s not so bad. Think of him as a walking battle-axe. I use him for killing people; I don’t sleep with him. Speaking of that, have you and Arissa resolved your differences yet?’

‘That harlot!’ Annias said with a certain contempt.

‘You knew what she was when you took up with her, Annias,’ Martel told him. ‘I thought her depravity was part of what attracted you to her.’ Martel leaned back. ‘It must be Bhelliom,’ he mused.

‘What must?’