Shadow

Chapter Twenty-One

They dragged him, bleeding and dizzy, from the cart to the tent flap (and as his feet trailed behind him, each bump and jolt jarring the broken bone, flooding his body and mind with pain, two crows got up out of a dead spruce tree and flew away). The sentry outside the tent blocked their way with his spear.

'What's the hurry?' he asked suspiciously. 'And what's that?'

'Top priority is what it is,' snapped the trooper on his left. 'Urgent. You know what urgent means?'

'It's all right.' The voice came from inside the tent. 'Let them through, I'm expecting them.' A hand pulled back the tent flap, and they hauled him through and lowered him to the ground like a sack of grain, gently enough to stop him splitting open, but beyond that, not too bothered.

'Lift his head.' A hand gathered enough hair for a grip and pulled upwards, lifting his head enough for him to see the man in the tent. 'That's him. Fine, good work. Now, you two go and get something to eat, catch a few hours' sleep. We're moving out just before dawn.'

Monach opened his eyes, and shivered. He couldn't see the two troopers now, so he assumed they were saluting or whatever cavalrymen did; all he could see was six square inches of threadbare carpet. But he could hear the rustling of canvas, which led him to believe they'd left the tent.

'Do you know who I am?' the voice said. A pause-he didn't reply, mostly because that would involve moving his jaw, which would be very painful. 'Hello, can you hear me? I asked you a question.'

Something hit him just above the waist, confirming his impression that at least one rib on that side was broken. He rode out the pain like a man in a small boat in a gale; so long as his connection with this body was minimal, he could stay above the breakers, not get swamped by them. In seventh grade they'd studied the classical techniques for enduring and ignoring pain. He'd done all right in the seventh grade, enough to scrape a pass, and the high marks he was getting in swordsmanship and religious theory made up for it.

'Well,' the man said, 'in case you don't know who I am, though I'm pretty certain you do, my name is Feron Amathy. What's yours?'

Good question; and it occurred to him that if he didn't answer, the man might kick him in the ribs again. He didn't want that. He couldn't remember his name; but he knew a name he'd called himself once or twice, when on a mission using a persona. He opened his mouth-his jaw hurt like hell-and managed to make a noise that sounded like 'Monach'.

'Yes,' the man replied. 'I know. Just wanted to see if you'd tell me the truth. It's what we call a control; ask questions you know the answer to, it helps you get a feel for whether the subject's likely to lie or not. So,' he went on, sitting down in the chair whose feet Monach could just make out in line with his nose, 'you're the famous Monach, are you? Bloody hell, you're a mess. What on earth did they do to you?'

He hoped that was a rhetorical question, because he couldn't remember. Generally speaking, if you want an accurate description of a fight, don't ask the man lying on the ground getting kicked and stamped on. All he can see is boots and ankles, and his concentration is apt to wander.

'Actually,' the man went on, 'your name isn't Monach at all. It's confusing, because all you damn monks have so many names-the one you were born with, the name-in-religion you get given when you're a kid novice, the other name-in-religion you take when you're ordained, not to mention the names you use when you go out into the world making trouble for regular people.' He sighed. 'In your case,' he said, 'I know them all. First you were Huon Josce. Then you were Valcennius-named after the author of six obscure commentaries on the Digest, though you didn't know it at the time. Then you were Brother Credizen; and when you're out murdering people, you're Soishen Monach.' He smiled. 'Took my people weeks to find all that stuff out. You should be flattered.'

Monach felt sick, as if all the skin had been flayed off his face and the man had just drawn his fingertip across it. It was absurd, of course, to feel shocked and horrified about the violation of his names, bearing in mind what was about to happen to him. But he couldn't help it; it was instinct, like everything that mattered in religion.

'Looks like you must've put up a hell of a fight,' the man went on. 'Which did neither of us any favours, of course. You got beaten into mush, I can't get a sensible word out of you. If you'd given up and come quietly, think how much better it'd have been for both of us.' He heard the chair creak, and the feet in front of his eyes moved. 'Let's get you sitting up,' he said. 'We might have better luck if you're not sprawled all over the floor like a heap of old washing.'

The man was strong, and not fussed about what hurt and what didn't. When he opened his eyes again, his mind washed clean by the waves of pain, Monach was sitting in a chair. Opposite him was the man who'd been talking.

'Better?' the man asked. 'All right, now, you're going to have to make an effort and answer my questions, because it's very important and there's not much time. If you don't, I'll take this stick and find out which of your bones are broken. If you understand, nod once.'

Nodding wasn't too hard. He managed it. That seemed to please the man, because he nodded back and sat down in his chair, a three-foot thumb-thick rod of ashwood across his knees. He was older than Monach had expected, at least forty, with plenty of curly brown hair and a slightly patchy brown beard, thick on the cheeks and jaws but a little frayed-looking on the chin itself. He had a pointed nose, a heart-shaped face and bright, friendly brown eyes.

'Splendid,' the man said. 'All right, pay attention. Do you know where General Cronan is?'

Apparently he did, because his head lifted up and then flopped back, jarring his jaw and making him shudder. Once he'd nodded, he remembered who Cronan was, and the vital importance to the order and the empire of not answering the question he'd just answered.

'Yes? And?'

He felt himself trying to say something. 'At the Faith and Fortitude,' he heard himself say, 'on the road from Josequin to Selce.' The words came out fluently, like a child wetting his bed in spite of his best efforts to control his bladder. He couldn't help thinking that if only he still had his names, that wouldn't have happened.

'I know where you mean,' the man said. 'Very good, now we're getting somewhere. Next question: have you sent some of your people to kill him?'

Just a dip of the head this time, to indicate Yes.

'Buggery. When?'

'This morning,' he answered. No hesitation now. 'About two hours before noon.'

'Which means-how were they going? On foot, horseback, wagon?'

He opened his mouth to reply but started coughing instead. Coughing was a very bad idea. The man didn't approve, either, because he repeated his question, loudly.

'Riding,' Monach managed to say. 'Not hurrying. Can't risk.'

'Were they taking the main road?'

A nod.

'That's something, I suppose. All right, stay there, don't go away.'

The man left the tent, shouting a name, and left him alone. That was wonderful; he'd have a chance to relax, to catch up with the pain, which was racing ahead of his thoughts and blocking their way. He closed his eyes-it was better with them shut, in spite of the dizziness. At the back of his mind something was protesting: no, you mustn't close your eyes, you'll fall asleep or pass out. This is your only chance; look, there's a knife on the map table, you can reach it if you tilt the legs of the chair. You can hide it under your am, and when he comes back you can stab him or cut his throat, and that'll make up for the rest. Must do it, can't afford not to. You've done very badly, but you still have one chance. Won't get another. Must He stayed still, put the voice out of his mind. Objectively he weighed up the conflicting demands on him. On the one hand there was the future of the order and the empire; on the other, the thought of the effort and pain, and the even worse pain if he tried and failed. It wasn't a difficult choice. Nothing outside his body mattered, outside his body and the invisible circle of pain that surrounded it. The pain defined everything.

A while later Feron Amathy came back. He looked unhappy. 'I've sent thirty light cavalry up the old drovers' trail, so if the Lihac's fordable they ought to get there an hour or so before your assassins. Still, it's cutting it fine.'

He sounded like a senior officer briefing a delinquent subordinate, not one enemy telling another how he'd frustrated his plans and made the sacrifice of his life to the cause meaningless. It wasn't cruelty, Monach figured, just a busy man thinking aloud, as busy men so often do. Probably he found it useful having someone to talk to, even if it was only a defeated, humiliated opponent. Monach could feel the other man's weariness, the tremendous weight of responsibility clamping down on his shoulders. 'Now then,' Feron Amathy said, flopping back into his chair and letting his arms hang down. 'What are we going to do with you, I wonder? My instinct says send your head back to Deymeson with an apple stuck in your mouth, to let them know I'm perfectly well aware of what they're up to. On the other hand, why give them any more information than necessary? So long as they aren't sure whether I've worked out that they're involved, they'll have to cover both contingencies, which'll slow up their planning. In which case, I can either have you strung up here, make a show of it, issue double rations, give the lads something to cheer them up; or I could keep you for later, assuming you survive. God only knows what sort of useful stuff you've got locked up in your head, but will prising it out of there be more trouble than it's worth?' He sighed. 'Truth is,' he went on, 'nobody else is fit to interrogate you. Even in the state you're in you're probably too smart for them, and I can't afford to let you muck me about with disinformation. I haven't got the time or, let's face it, the energy. Besides, you've caused me a real headache and until those cavalry troopers get back from Selce I can't be sure you haven't really screwed everything up.' He sighed. 'I think I'll knock you on the head now,' he went on. 'Anything else is just wasting valuable time.' As he said that, he stood up, drawing a short knife from the sash round his waist, and stepped into Monach's circle.

Monach closed his eyes. Dying in a manner befitting a member of the order had been covered in some detail in eighth grade, and he'd come third out of twenty. The key to the approved technique was dignity, acceptance, faith in a higher purpose.

Keeping his eyes closed, he visualised the course the knife and the hand holding it would have to take (assuming Feron Amathy was proposing to sever his jugular vein). He saw the left hand spreading to press down on his ear, to keep his head steady while the right hand cut; it was the obvious vulnerable moment, because it's always a mistake to place your body into the enemy's circle unless it's led by your weapon. At the perfect moment he reached up with his right hand, caught hold of the other man's left index finger, pressed it back sharply and broke it.

Feron Amathy squealed, his instinct making him try to pull away. That was good. Monach increased his grip on the broken finger so that Feron Amathy, trying to yank his hand back, put most of his body weight into the area of maximum pain. Excellent: in tight corners, use pain to confuse the enemy, force him to overlook his advantage and his opportunity for a single finishing cut. In the meanwhile Monach had time to shift his position on the ground (not that he wanted to, but he supposed it had to be done), enough so that he could get his left hand round the other man's right wrist and shake the knife out of it. At some point during this manoeuvre a spike of pain made him open his eyes and he found that he was looking directly at Feron Amathy's face. He saw the fear and smiled, just as the knife hit the ground.

He let go of the other man's wrist and gathered up the knife. As anticipated, Feron Amathy pulled away with all his strength, freeing his broken finger and screaming as the pain lit up his whole body. Monach took advantage of having his right hand free again by slamming the heel of it up under the other man's chin. Quite correctly, Feron Amathy slumped backwards, landing on his broken finger and howling.

In Monach's mind, the calm, contemptuous voice of Father Tutor told him to assess the situation objectively. For the moment he had a total ascendency, but it was a moot point whether it would last long enough for him to get in close and kill the enemy, especially given his own wretched condition. Any attempt at a finishing cut would only provoke a furious instinctive resistance, like the one he'd just put up, which could easily lead to disaster in spite of his superiority in technique and firm grasp of theory. If, on the other hand, he chose to get up and leave the tent, it was highly unlikely that Feron Amathy would try to pursue him personally. Instead he'd yell at the top of his voice for the guard, and by the time they arrived anybody who'd attained a pass in grade five, let alone a second-class distinction, ought to be among the shadows and halfway to making a perfect escape, regardless of any previous injuries.

As always, Father Tutor was right, and the idea that here was a moment of destiny, when he had the crucial Feron Amathy at his mercy and could kill him easily, was just an illusion. Someone with less discipline, less training, less skill in the interpretation of theory might be fooled into thinking that this was a point at which the world would change for ever, but Monach knew better. Only a god could do something like that.

An intriguing thought occurred to him. Not all that long ago he'd almost managed to convince himself that he was the god Poldarn. He'd talked himself out of it, reasonably enough, but somewhere in his mind there lingered just a smear of a suspicion. Now, if he really was a god, surely all he'd have to do was say the word, or just think it, and his injuries would miraculously heal. Gods, after all, can't be injured; they can project an illusion of injury, possibly well enough to deceive themselves, but no actual harm could come to them. It was worth a try.

He thought the command, and waited. For one very brief moment, he wasn't sure; then the pain reasserted itself, and he knew. Another theory knocked on the head. Never mind.

He made it to the tent flap before Feron Amathy started yelling for the guard. Any kind of movement was fairly close to being unbearable; walking should have been technically impossible, let alone running. Looked at from another angle, he had the time it would take for the guards to enter the tent and get their orders in which to get through the camp and into the village. He ran.

At exactly what point the idea took shape in his mind he couldn't say. It might even have been before he broke Feron Amathy's finger; certainly it had very nearly evolved into its final form when he stuck his head out of the tent and looked for an escape route. Partly it was desperation-who else did he know in Cric, after all? Of course, there was no reason whatsoever to suppose that the old man who might just be General Allectus would be inclined to help him. But if his guess was right, the old man would have nothing to lose by harbouring a fugitive, since if he was caught and recognised by a soldier from the Amathy house he'd be killed immediately in any case. A lot would depend on whether General Allectus saw it that way, of course. Always assuming he really was General Allectus.

It was a stupid idea; but it gave him something to focus on, a purpose. They'd taught him that long ago, at an age when other boys were still playing with wooden swords and fighting make-believe enemies: if you have to run, run towards something, not just away. The slightest trace of purpose will often keep back the smothering blanket of fear, which is nearly always a worse enemy than the source of danger itself, just as more people are killed by the smoke in a burning house than the actual fire.

His sense of direction was hazy, but he had an idea that when he'd been brought in he'd made a note in his mind that the general's tent was at right angles to the road through the camp, on the left-hand side. Find the road, turn left and keep going, parallel to it, picking a way through the rows of tents… He staggered as his knees and his breath collapsed simultaneously, but he managed to keep his balance by swaying wildly, like a drunken old man.

That was a thought. He tried to picture them in his mind, vague figures he'd seen in every town and city he'd been to; the mind filtered them out after a while, since they were of no possible importance and an eyesore into the bargain. He analysed their way of moving-unselfconscious, confident in a twisted sort of a way, since men with neither past nor future are rarely afraid of anything. He remembered one or two who were familiar sights from the lower town in Deymeson. Cripples, both of them; one, now he came to think of it, must have broken both legs at some point and had them heal without being set; the other had wrecked his back, or been born like it, so that he always walked along with his nose right down by his feet, the knuckles of his fingers dragging along the ground. As he adjusted his stance and posture to copy them, it occurred to him that they must spend their entire lives in something like the pain he felt now, and for a moment he was filled with admiration for their courage and endurance (because he would either die or escape, be rescued and healed; they would be here for ever, in the confined area of pain, the circle).

Whatever else he wasn't, Monach was a fine actor. The guards passed him three times: once, at the run, going towards the town; once, at the double, coming back; the last time, walking dejectedly, going out again. The third time he called out to them, a vague loud noise that was composed half out of words and the rest of mere roaring. They swung out a few yards further into the road to avoid him.

Cric village was deserted. Of course, it always would be at this time of night, since hard-working farmers rise and go to bed with the sun. Nobody here wasted good tallow by burning a lamp or a candle. There was just enough starlight to mark the difference between emptiness and the shadows of buildings. As he trudged and swayed and staggered, Monach found that although he felt the pain with each step, it wasn't actually troubling him-because it wasn't his, it belonged to the persona of the old drunk, a character he'd dragged into the world to carry his sufferings for him like a porter. Instead he used each ache and wrench and spike of pain as a foundation for his performance-the more it hurts, the less you feel it; that still made no more sense than it had twenty years ago, but the order had been of the opinion that learning it by heart would make him a better monk, more able to make the draw and understand the nature of the gods.

He hadn't been counting doors and there weren't any visual landmarks to guide him, but he knew which house belonged to the man he was looking for, because his instinct and intuition told him which one it was, and he believed in them as a true monk should. He felt for the latch and lifted it. It wasn't locked or bolted; Cric wasn't that sort of place.

'Hello?' He stepped inside, resisting the temptation to stand up straight in spite of the pain in his back and shoulders. Stay in persona until the very last moment, just in case. 'Hello,' he repeated, 'is anybody there?'

'All right, I can hear you,' replied a voice in the darkness. 'There's no need to shout.'

It was a voice he thought he recognised, at any rate. He tried to remember the name the old man had been using the last time he was here. Jolect; Jolect something or something Jolect, and he'd claimed to be a plain, ordinary retired soldier.

'Sergeant Jolect?' he said. 'Am I in the right house?'

The voice chuckled, 'what if I told you that you weren't?'

'That would depend,' Monach croaked as a surge of pain too broad and grand for him to ignore swept up from his knees to his chin.

'Depend on what?'

'On whether you're telling the truth.'

The voice chuckled again, this time with a little more colour. 'Yes, I'm called Jolect,' it said. 'But I was never a sergeant.'

'Would it be all right,' Monach asked, very quietly, 'if I sat down on your floor? Just for a moment or so.' Before the old man could answer, Monach pressed his back against the wall and slid down to the floor. It took him a great deal of effort not to yell and scream.

'By all means,' the old man said. 'I won't press you for your name,' he went on, 'but as and when you feel like mentioning it-'

'Vesser,' Monach said. 'Vesser Oldun. I-' He coughed, and took advantage of the pause to think. 'I was on the road, on my way home-I'm a trader, you see, I deal in small household stuff, buckles and pins and brooches and buttons, that sort of thing-and I was just a mile or so north-west of here, shortly before sunset, when some men on horses overtook me and-well, you can probably guess the rest. I lay there for a while until I felt strong enough to move, and made my way into town. Is there an inn here?'

'I'm afraid not.'

'Oh. Oh, that's a nuisance. I'm sorry,' Monach added, trying to ignore the pain in his jaw that came from so much talking, 'you must be wondering why I came bursting in here like that. The truth is, I was looking for an inn, as I said just now, and then all of a sudden I started feeling so weak and faint I simply couldn't stand up any more. So I pushed on the first door I came to, and it turned out to be yours. I'm terribly sorry if I'm causing you a lot of trouble or anything.'

'Not a bit of it,' the voice replied. 'Well, well, that is a surprise. I don't think anybody's been robbed in these parts for forty years, or at least that's what my neighbours have told me. Of course, I was away for a great many years and only came back here-what, a dozen years ago? Less than that, probably, I can't remember. Anyway, I can't vouch for it personally, for the reasons I just gave, but I'm fairly sure what they told me about the lack of robberies is more or less true. So, if someone's just set up in that line of work nearby, we'll have to do something about it.'

'Yes,' Monach said, struggling a little. 'Yes, you really should.' He could feel himself sliding into sleep, there was a dream already open and waiting for him to fall into it. 'Well, if there's no inn…'

The voice laughed. 'Don't worry about that,' he said. 'You're welcome to stay here for the night, or as long as you want to. In the morning, though, when the boy comes with my breakfast, I'll send him for one of my neighbours. She's very good with broken bones and medicines.'

Monach managed to thank him before his mind tripped and went sprawling into the dream Monach opened his eyes, and saw bright daylight. Instinctively he looked up, and saw a blue sky with a few smudges of high white cloud. The position of the sun told him it was mid-morning. It was very quiet, but he could sense that he wasn't alone. Something was about to happen.

He looked over his shoulder, and saw an army. They were drawn up in line of battle, and their formations stretched away on either side as far as he could see, thousands of men, standing at parade ease, all staring straight ahead. He turned back and tried to make out what it was that they all found so fascinating.

He couldn't see it. He and the army were just below the crest of a hogsback ridge, looking down a fairly gentle, even slope of what looked to him like average-to-good sheep grazing towards a quite substantial wood at the foot of a steep hill. There were no houses, barns, linhays or other buildings in sight, no walls or hedges or livestock. As views went it was pleasant enough, but rather dull.

I wonder who I am, he thought, but didn't allow himself to dwell on the point. He was sure he'd find out soon enough, and besides, it was only a dream.

'There, look,' somebody said, a few yards away on his right. He looked at the man who'd just spoken; his arm was outstretched and he was pointing. 'Just coming round the edge of the wood, look,' the man went on. Monach followed the line of his finger, but couldn't see anything. 'Can you see it, General?' the man went on, and Monach perceived that the words had been addressed to him. 'Outriders, probably,' the man went on, 'or mounted pioneers. Do you want me to send out a cavalry squad, see if we can cut them off?'

Damn, he's asking me a question, Monach thought, slightly flustered. If this dream is something that really happened, what if I give the wrong order, and we lose the battle? Or win the battle, for that matter, when we should've lost it? Would that mean I'd be trapped in this dream and unable to get back out again?

'It's funny you should say that.' Monach looked round; standing right next to him on his left was the old man from Cric, the one who might once have been General Allectus, the one on whose floor Monach's body was sleeping.

'I'm sorry?' Monach said.

'It's quite all right,' the old man said. 'And I shouldn't have startled you like that. No, it's all right. No matter what orders you give them, I'll still lose the battle, history will take its course. Those men there-' he gestured to his left with the back of his hand, 'the Amathy house,' he went on, 'they'll change sides as soon as things start to go wrong for me, and that'll be that. But we're drifting away from the point, I apologise. I just wanted to set your mind at rest, so you can enjoy the dream without fretting about getting home again afterwards.'

'Thank you,' Monach felt obliged to say.

'My pleasure. Now, what was I about to tell you? Oh yes.' The old man wiped a strand of fine white hair out of his eyes; the wind was getting up, and here on the slope they were in a position to catch the worst of it. 'This idea of yours about getting trapped in a dream.'

'What? Oh, right, I see.'

'It's not a new thought,' the old man went on. 'In fact, in some versions of the Poldarn myth, that's what happens to him; he falls asleep under a lime tree on Deymeson Hill and in his dream he suddenly finds himself sitting on the box of a cart, dragging across the moors to a place called Cric. But he doesn't remember who he is or where he came from, or anything like that, let alone the fact that he's a god, not a mortal.' The old man laughed; he seemed to be in rare high spirits. Of course, he was younger than Monach remembered him. 'Anyway,' he went on, 'what my men-sorry, your men-are looking out for is the first sign of General Cronan's army, which is due to come out from behind that wood any moment now. When it does, you'll give the order to stay put and receive them here. It's a very sensible order, and even now I can't help wondering what'd have happened if they'd obeyed it.' He sighed, and suddenly he was an old man again, though only for a moment. 'They don't, of course,' he went on. 'They let Cronan's men get halfway up this slope, and suddenly take it into their minds to charge. That works very well to begin with, until Cronan springs his trap and two thousand heavy cavalry come out of the wood, race up the hill on the flanks and cut us in half. The lower half keeps on pushing forward, bursts through the line and carries on down the slope and into that wood. They don't come out again, ever. The top half-well, Feron Amathy changes sides, and the rest of them pull back in good order to the top of the ridge and withdraw from the field. I-you-we stay here, trying to rally enough men for a stand; the enemy cavalry catch sight of us and at the last minute we break and run away-you and me with them, of course, which is why I'm alive and trapped here. If for some reason you decide to stay, please try not to win the battle. As I told you a moment ago, winning'd be the easy option. And it wouldn't matter, even if you did win. You'd still lose, but it'd all take longer and the casualties would be higher. Ah,' the old man said sharply, 'they're here, and about time too.'

As the enemy army became visible inside the wood, they put up a colony of rooks and crows that flew ahead of them for a while, like the slow, shallow wave that comes before the breakers. 'In a sense,' the old man was saying, 'all battles are just unpleasant, conscience-stricken memories, just as this one is; they've all happened before, and the only difference lies in who's dreaming them this time. Then again, you can pass off all kinds of old rubbish by tacking in a sense in front of it.'

Monach squinted; the wind was making his eyes water. 'I can see them now,' he said.

'Can you? Splendid.' The old man was looking at them too. 'Interesting, I suppose, that you chose to come here, before the battle started. My guess is that your instincts led you to the moment before the draw, the point where they violate our circle. Since you believe in religion, the next part, the battle itself, doesn't really exist; there's just the moment before and the moment after. Or am I oversimplifying?'

'Yes,' Monach replied, 'you are. The battle wouldn't exist only if this was a perfect world, which it isn't, or if you and I were gods, which we aren't.'

The old man grinned. 'I'm not, for sure. As for you-well, I can't see that it matters all that much, one way or the other. If I told you, Yes, you're definitely a god, take my word for it, you wouldn't believe me, after all. You'd say this is just a dream, and your dream at that.'

Monach wasn't sure whether that was a divine revelation or simple teasing. He thought it best to ignore it, on either count. 'So,' he said, as his instincts urged him to counterattack, 'you really are General Allectus, then? May I ask, what're you doing hiding out in a wretched little dump like this?'

'I was born here,' Allectus replied. 'Not in the village, you understand; my grandfather owned the whole valley and half the moor-it was more trouble and expense than it was worth, which is why when he died my father just forgot about it, stopped trying to collect the rents, let the house fall down; at the best of times the income from the estate wasn't enough to pay the gardeners at our main house, in Torcea.' He wiped something out of the corner of his eye, a speck of dust or grit, or a small gnat. 'But yes, we had a house here. If there's time, you might make a detour and take a look at the ruins, if there's anything still there to see; the villagers have been tearing it up for building stone for forty years, so there's probably not much left. And yes, I was born here, while the family was spending the summer out here one year. We moved around a lot then, tracking from estate to estate, like a bunch of itinerants roaming the countryside with all our possessions packed in a cart. Of course it had to be a very big cart to get all our stuff inside. But a cart's a cart.' He shook his head. 'Anyway,' he continued. 'When I lost the battle and my army and found myself in these parts, alone and with a price on my head, I suppose a sort of homing instinct drew me back.' He smiled. 'And it helped that I could remember a few bits and pieces from our visits here when I was a boy. I remembered the name of a servant we hired from this village who was just about my age, by the name of Jolect. He left with us, caught a fever and died. I hardly knew him. But when I came here, I decided to be him, coming home after a lifetime of service in the army. Fortuitously, the Jolect family had died out in the meanwhile, so nobody was left to say I wasn't who I claimed to be; besides, nobody cared. I had twelve gross-quarters in gold coin when I arrived here-it was my pocket change, the day I ran away from this battle, but enough to represent a time-expired veteran's life savings, enough to make me a rich man in Cric. I gave it to my neighbours so they could buy all the things they couldn't grow or make-iron and steel for ploughs and tools, mostly, and some other materials, enough to last all of Cric for a generation-and in return I have this fine house, and they'll feed and clothe me till I die. What more could a god ask?'

Monach didn't say anything.

'Besides,' Allectus went on, 'there's a beautiful symmetry about it. I was born the son and heir to this huge demesne-worthless, maybe, but vast by any standards-and now in my old age here I am again, the squire, the old master, loved, respected, tolerated and put up with by my faithful tenants.' He pulled an exaggeratedly sad face, as the sun flashed alarmingly on the spears of Cronan's army, far away in the distance. 'We have a habit of turning out to be what we're supposed to be, regardless of whether we like it or not, or know it or not. If you understood religion instead of just knowing all about it, you'd see that that's what the Poldarn story's all about, an allegory for that simple fact. Of course the Poldarn story also happens to be true, every word of it, but that doesn't stop it being an allegory as well. You can stay here as long as you like, you know.'

Monach didn't quite follow. 'What, here, you mean? This battle?'

'No, of course not. In Cric. At my house. After the pounding you took from the Amathy house, it'll be a week at least before you're fit to move, and besides, it won't be healthy for you in these parts until Feron Amathy moves on. Escaping was bad enough; breaking his finger into the bargain-that's a bad loss of face, he'll be taking it very seriously. But you'll be safe here.'

'Thank you,' Monach said, as General Cronan's army began to climb the slope. It was large, but not as big as his, Allectus', own. In the middle was a hedge of pikes, with a wispy line of skirmishers strewn untidily in front of it and blocks of armoured foot soldiers and cavalry on either wing. Behind the pikes he could see the baggage train, a sloppy column of carts and mules, packed too closely together. 'That's very kind of you.'

'On the contrary,' Allectus replied. 'After all, you're the man who's undertaken to kill my deadly enemy, General Cronan-not that you'll succeed, of course, but it's the thought that counts. If anything happens to me, by the way, don't panic. Just keep out of sight when they bring in the food, and leave the dirty plates and the washing. Sometimes I stay in the back room sulking for weeks on end, so they won't think anything of it; and as for the smell-well, who's going to notice, in here?'

'Thank you,' Monach repeated. He was aware of the army above and around him starting to get restless, muttering and shuffling. 'Am I really going to fail in the mission?'

'Yes,' Allectus told him, 'but not for the reason you think. You see, nobody knows where Cronan is; that's why he wasn't here, wasn't on the road where he should have been, wasn't where he told his people he was going to be. The plain fact is, he vanished a couple of months ago, on his way to Josequin, and nobody's seen or heard of him since.'

'What?' Monach shouted, but he couldn't make himself heard; his army had decided to ignore his orders and charge down the slope, and a moment later he was on the ground, his arms over his head to protect it from the boots and knees of the soldiers all around him. Allectus had vanished, in any case. Monach wound himself up into a ball, squeezing his legs and elbows in as tight as he could to get them out of harm's way, but a man running flat out tripped over him, and the men behind piled up on top of him, until Monach was buried under a mound of jerking, squirming bodies (a living grave, he thought, now that's original). He tried to breathe, but it rapidly went from difficult to impossible, at which point he suffocated and died -And sat up, to find both hands clamped tight over his nose and mouth, which would explain the asphyxiation. Thin spikes of sunlight were intruding under the door and between the gaps in the old, warped timbers of the shutters. He felt cold, probably because he was soaked in sweat. He tried to remember the dream he'd just tumbled out of, but it had passed by.

Next he tried to move, and that was a very bad idea. In eighth grade they'd done wounds, including how to recognise your own; they'd been taught a cumulative assessment system-ten points for a broken collarbone, thirty for an arm, fifty for a leg; you chose your course of action on the basis of your running total, and if it came to more than two hundred there was no recommended course of action. On that basis, he scored somewhere between one hundred and eighty and two hundred and fifteen, depending on whether there was major internal bleeding around the smashed ribs.

'Hello,' he called out. He could remember his host saying something about some local wise woman or witch doctor; country medicine wouldn't have been his first choice, but it was better than dying or (worse still, in a way) healing up with unset bones and being a cripple for the rest of his life. Not that he wanted to impose on his host in any way, but that was one offer of help he could reconcile himself to accepting.

'Hello,' he repeated, and then he realised that the shape in the corner, which he'd been assuming was a sack or a pile of old clothes, was a body.

He sighed. Too much to hope for, obviously, that the old fool could somehow manage to stay alive long enough to arrange for the doctor to call. That would've been too easy, not a sufficient challenge for a brother tutor of the order. The statistical probabilities intrigued him; of the two of them, he'd have bet money on who was more likely to survive the night, and he'd have lost.

If anything happens to me, by the way, don't panic. Just keep out of sight when they bring in the food, and leave the dirty plates and the washing. Someone had said that to him recently, but he couldn't remember who. He frowned-even frowning hurt, the tightening of the skin across his forehead tugging apart the lips of a gash that was only just beginning to knit together. Maybe the old man had said it last night, when he was drowsy and half asleep.

In the ninth grade they'd taught them basic field medicine and surgery, with a short and mostly hilarious session on how to set your own bones and bind your own wounds. It had been too close to the end of the term; they'd all been worn out with study, saturated with too much information, and nobody had really made any kind of an effort to learn the stuff properly. For the rest of the day, therefore, he was forced to rely on trial and error and instinct as much as authorised procedures. That was a great pity, since experimenting on one's own broken bones is a painful and demoralising experience. For bandages he had to use strips of the late General Allectus' threadbare and filthy carpet-a genuine Morevish tent rug, no less-which he slowly sawed and hacked to shape with Feron Amathy's unpractically shaped knife. All day he was pitifully thirsty, and there was a water jug no more than ten feet away, but somehow he never got around to crawling across the room and fetching it.

Eventually the splinters of light began to fade, suggesting the onset of evening. He wasn't conscious when the food arrived-he passed out at least a dozen times that day because of the pain and his general condition-and he woke up out of an involuntary doze to hear the door closing. Once he'd got the panic under control, he listened for the sound of someone moving about or breathing; while he was holding still and doing that, he had time to work out the various possible explanations for what he'd heard and the odds on each of them. The likeliest explanation was that the villagers were used to Allectus being asleep or crazy out of his mind, and left the food and the house without saying a word or making a loud noise. That would suit him just fine, of course. The food and the water and the clean clothes would be left beside the door; all he had to do was get from the inner room to the main room without tearing the loose confederation of injuries he called his body.

And if he didn't do that, of course, he'd be in desperate trouble, because if they came in and found that the food and drink hadn't been touched they'd be concerned (good, caring neighbours that they were), and would put their heads round the partition to make sure he was all right, and they'd find Allectus dead and a strange man propped up next to him.

So, taking advantage of their good nature was suddenly compulsory. Monach laughed; the whole thing was ludicrous, especially for a good monk and a student of ethical theory. He couldn't wait to get back to Deymeson and pitch it to his ethics class for discussion: Under what circumstances are deception and theft justifiable in the name of expediency? What difference does it make that the intended recipient of the charity is dead? That the deceiver's life is at stake? That the intended recipient gave his permission for the fraud?

Had he? Monach seemed to remember that he had, but not the exact context. Either Allectus had told him so, in unambiguous terms, or he'd dreamed it (Discuss, with reference to the moral ambiguity of unsubstantiated perceptions…). Remembering was difficult, and getting more so. It was just as well he'd had such a firm foundation in mental discipline.

He closed his eyes. Outside it was raining, but he couldn't hear that. He couldn't hear the sound of boots squelching in mud, or cartwheels in the street, as the Amathy house left Cric and went to war.

What difference would it make if the deceiver acts in furtherance of the general good? Of a manifest destiny? What difference would it make if the deceiver incorrectly but sincerely believes that he acts in furtherance of a just cause or a manifest destiny? What difference would it make if the deceiver commits the deception knowing that the legitimate just cause or manifest destiny so authorising his deception has failed? Assuming that the deceiver is so justified, would that justification extend to fraudulent use or consumption of articles conducive to mere physical comfort, as opposed to the bare essentials required for survival? In such context, what would such bare essentials consist of?

What difference would it make if the deceiver were a god?