Dolmant actually smirked. ‘A vote to repeal is a matter of substance, Sephrenia, and he doesn’t have the votes.’

There was a respectful knock on the door, and Dolmant answered it. A servant spoke with him for a moment.

‘That cook just died,’ Dolmant said to Sparhawk and Sephrenia, sounding a bit shocked. ‘Wait here a moment. The physician wants to talk with me.’

‘Strange,’ Sparhawk murmured.

‘People do die of natural causes, Sparhawk,’ Sephrenia told him.

‘Not in my profession – at least not very often.’

‘Maybe he was old.’

Dolmant returned, his face very pale. ‘He was poisoned!’ he exclaimed.

‘What?’ Sparhawk demanded.

‘That cook of mine was poisoned, and the physician says that the poison was in the porridge the man was preparing for breakfast. That porridge could have killed everyone in the house.’

‘Perhaps you’d like to reconsider your position on the notion of arresting Annias, Your Grace,’ Sparhawk said grimly.

‘Surely you don’t believe –’ Dolmant broke off, his eyes suddenly very wide.

‘He’s already had a hand in the poisoning of Aldreas and Ehlana, Your Grace,’ Sparhawk said. ‘I doubt that he’d choke very much over a few Patriarchs and a score or so Church Knights.’

‘The man’s a monster!’ Then Dolmant started to swear, using oaths more common to a barracks than a theological seminary.

‘You’d better tell Emban to circulate word of this to the Patriarchs loyal to us, Dolmant,’ Sephrenia advised. ‘It appears that Annias may have come up with a cheaper way to win an election.’

‘I’d better start rousing the others,’ Sparhawk said, rising to his feet. ‘I want to tell them about this, and it takes a while to get into full armour.’

It was still dark when they set out for the Basilica accompanied by fifteen armoured knights from each of the four orders. Sixty Church Knights, it had been decided, was a force with which few would care to interfere.

The sky to the east was beginning to show that first pale stain of daylight when they reached the great domed church which was at the very centre of the Holy City - its thought and spirit as well as its geography. The entrance into the city of the column of Pandions, Cyrinics, Genidians and Alciones the previous night had not gone unnoticed, and the torchlit bronze portal leading into the vast court before the Basilica was guarded by a hundred and fifty red-tunicked church soldiers under the command of that same captain who, at Makova’s orders, had attempted to prevent the departure of Sparhawk and his companions from the Pandion chapterhouse on their journey to Borrata. ‘Halt!’ he commanded in an imperious, even insulting tone.

‘Would you attempt to deny entrance to Patriarchs of the Church, Captain?’ Preceptor Abriel asked in a level tone, ‘knowing that you thereby imperil your soul?’

‘His neck too,’ Ulath muttered to Tynian.