‘I think we’ve stolen a march on your friend Martel, Vanion,’ Preceptor Abriel said.
‘Have you looked over the wall lately, Abriel?’ Vanion asked dryly.
‘As a matter of fact, I have,’ Abriel said, ‘and that’s exactly what I’m talking about. As Sir Sparhawk told us yesterday, this Martel couldn’t believe that we’d abandon the outer city without a fight, so he didn’t take it into account when he made his plans. He made no attempt to keep his scouts out of the city, and those scouts are just the forerunners of the main body of looters. As soon as his scouts found that the city was unprotected, they rushed in to loot the houses and most of the rest of the army followed. Martel’s completely lost control of his forces now, and he won’t regain it until the outer city is picked clean. Not only that, as soon as his soldiers have as much as they can carry, they’ll begin to desert.’
‘I cannot encourage theft,’ Patriarch Ortzel said rigidly, ‘but under the circumstances –’ A faint, almost sly smile touched his thin lips.
‘Wealth needs to be redistributed from time to time, Ortzel,’ Emban pontificated. ‘People with too much money have too much time to think up assorted sins to commit. Perhaps this is God’s way of restoring the filthy rich to a condition of wholesome poverty.’
‘I wonder if you’d feel the same way if your own house were being looted.’
‘That might influence my opinion, all right,’ Emban conceded.
‘God’s ways are mysterious,’ Bevier said devoutly. ‘We had no choice but to abandon the outer city, and that may be the one thing that will save us.’
‘I don’t think we can count on enough desertions from Martel’s ranks to grow complacent, gentlemen,’ Vanion said. ‘The rampage of his troops will gain us some time, I’ll grant you.’ He looked around at the other Preceptors. ‘A week, perhaps?’ he asked.
‘At the very most,’ Komier said. ‘There are a lot of men out there, and they’re very busy. It’s not going to take them all that long to strip the city.’
‘And that’s when the killing’s going to start,’ Kalten said. ‘As you said, Lord Komier, there are a lot of men out there, and I’m fairly sure that not all of them got into the city. The ones who are still outside are just as greedy as the ones who got here first. It’s going to be chaotic for a while, I think, and it’s going to take Martel quite a bit longer to regain control. ’
‘He’s probably right,’ Komier grunted. ‘Either way, we’ve got some time. There are four gates into the inner city here, and most of them aren’t much better than the ones in the outer wall. One gate’s easier to defend than four, so why don’t we fix it that way?’
‘Are you going to make the gates disappear by magic, Komier?’ Emban asked. ‘I know the Church Knights are trained to do many unusual things, but this is the Holy City, after all. Would God really approve of that sort of thing on his own doorstep?’
‘I never even thought of magic,’ Komier admitted. ‘Actually, I wasn’t going to use anything like that. It’s very hard to batter down a gate if there are two or three collapsed houses piled up behind it, isn’t it?’
‘Almost impossible,’ Abriel agreed.
Emban grinned broadly. ‘Isn’t Makova’s house fairly close to the east gate of the inner city?’ he asked.
‘Now that you mention it, Your Grace, I do believe it is,’ Sir Nashan replied.
‘A fairly substantial house?’ Komier said.
‘It certainly should be,’ Emban said, ‘considering what he paid for it.’
‘What the Elenian taxpayers paid for it, Your Grace,’ Sparhawk corrected.
‘Ah, yes. I’d almost forgotten that. Would the Elenian taxpayers be willing to contribute that very expensive house to the defence of the Church?’
‘They’d be delighted, Your Grace.’
‘We’ll certainly look the house of the Patriarch of Coombe over very carefully when we’re selecting the ones to tear down,’ Komier promised.
‘The only question now is the whereabouts of King Wargun,’ Dolmant said. ‘Martel’s blunder has bought us some time, but it won’t keep him out of the inner city forever. Could your messengers have gone astray, Ortzel?’
‘They’re good, solid men,’ Ortzel said, ‘and an army of the size of Wargun’s shouldn’t be hard to find. Besides, the messengers you and Emban sent earlier should have reached him quite some time ago, shouldn’t they?’
‘Not to mention the ones the Earl of Lenda sent from Cimmura,’ Sparhawk added.
‘The absence of the King of Thalesia is a mystery,’ Emban said, ‘and it’s becoming increasingly inconvenient. ’
The door opened, and Berit entered. ‘Excuse me, My Lords,’ he apologized, ‘but you wanted to be informed if anything unusual was happening out in the city.’
‘What have you seen, Berit?’ Vanion asked him.
‘I was up in that little house on top of the dome of the Basilica, My Lord –’
‘Cupola,’ Vanion corrected.
‘I can never remember that word,’ Berit confessed. ‘Anyway, you can see the whole city from up there. The ordinary people are fleeing from Chyrellos. They’re streaming out through all of the gates in the outer wall.’
‘Martel doesn’t want them underfoot,’ Kalten said.
‘And he wants the women out of town,’ Sparhawk added bleakly.
‘I didn’t quite understand that, Sparhawk,’ Bevier said.
‘I’ll explain it to you later,’ Sparhawk told him, glancing at Sephrenia.
There was a knock on the door, and a Pandion Knight entered. He was holding Talen by the arm, and the boy from the streets of Cimmura had a disgusted expression on his face and a fair-sized sack in one hand. ‘You wanted to see this young fellow, Sir Sparhawk?’ the Pandion asked.
‘Yes,’ Sparhawk replied. ‘Thank you, Sir Knight.’ He looked rather sternly at Talen. ‘Where have you been?’ he asked directly.
Talen’s expression grew evasive. ‘Ah – here and there, My Lord,’ he replied.
‘You know that’s not going to work, Talen,’ Sparhawk said wearily. ‘I’ll get the answer out of you eventually anyway, so why bother trying to hide it?’