If the directions he had given them were to be credited, then they could expect to reach it by sundown of the second day.
The night had been long and exhausting, and almost all of them were suffering from minor wounds of one kind or another, and they were hungry. So at first light, they stopped and made a little camp on the east slope of a low hill from whose top it was possible to keep an eye back along the way they had just come.
Within moments, several of them were asleep. Raphael and Yasper made the rounds of those who had been injured, cleaning, stitching, and bandaging their wounds. Percival, who had not suffered so much as a scratch, went to the hilltop to take the first watch. Feronantus got a little fire going. Finn, who claimed he could smell water, draped himself with every waterskin and bottle they had and set out on foot—for he was sick of riding—toward the faint suggestion of a gully that was visible a few bowshots to the north of them.
A bit of time—perhaps the better part of an hour—slipped by as they drowsed, mended, or just sat quietly watching the sun rise.
Then the calm was broken by a cry from Vera. They did not understand the words, since she was speaking in her native tongue, but no one could mistake her tone. She had jumped to her feet and was gazing in alarm to the north. She turned her head toward the top of the hill, and Cnán followed her gaze to see Percival leaning back comfortably against the body of his horse, which had lain down to sleep. Percival, gazing fixedly at the sky, looked no more alert than the horse. His movements were those of a man just stirring awake—or coming out of a trance.
Soon enough, they were all awake and on their feet. Feronantus and Istvan, closest to the ponies, snatched up weapons and mounted.
A lone rider had come across the steppe and achieved the difficult feat of sneaking up on Finn.
From Percival’s vantage point, this interloper ought to have been visible from miles away, but Percival had fallen asleep—or what amounted to the same thing, fallen into one of his visions.
Finn, toiling down in the depths of an overgrown gully, filling his water bottles, had been unaware he was being stalked and had clambered up into the open to find himself confronted by the lone Mongol rider, helmeted and armored, with a bladed lance couched under his arm.
Finn, as always, had his own lance; he’d been using it as a sort of hiking staff as he clambered up out of the gully. Startled by the rider—who came right at him—and encumbered by a heavy load of water, he managed to step back and swing the weapon’s tip down, knocking the tip of the Mongol’s lance down and aside just a moment before it would have penetrated his rib cage. The Mongol rode past him. Finn’s body jerked hard and twisted around awkwardly. He was pulled off his feet and dragged for a couple of yards before the Mongol’s horse stumbled to a halt.
The attacker’s lance had missed Finn’s body but became involved in the tangle of straps and ropes by which the water vessels were slung over Finn’s shoulders.
With the horse stopped, Finn might have had his opportunity to regain his footing and to disengage himself. But his foe was already in motion. The Mongol swung down out of his saddle. As he did, his long mane of gray hair billowed around him in the morning sun. For a moment, he was on the opposite side of the horse from Finn, but he ducked under the horse’s neck and came up behind Finn and wrapped him in a wrestling hold with the speed of a striking snake. Finn’s brothers and sisters on the hill above let out a cry of horror, shame, and grief.
Alchiq’s massive arms scissored, then relaxed. Finn’s corpse bounced on the ground at Alchiq’s feet.
Alchiq then turned and gazed up calmly toward Feronantus and Istvan, who were headed for him at a full gallop, both bellowing with rage and pain. He reached down and pulled his lance free, then was up on his pony’s back and galloping north with the adroitness that only a veteran Mongol warrior was capable of.
North across the steppe, he was pursued by the vengeful Shield-Brethren, but the only thing swift enough to catch up with him were the wrenching cries of Finn’s companions.
33
Lucerna Corporis Est Oculus
“DO YOU SMELL something burning?” Colonna asked, rousing from the meditative mood he had fallen into.
Capocci dropped his latest de-stingered scorpion into the clay jar and raised his head to sniff at the musty air of their underground prison. When they had first arrived in the tunnels and broken corridors beneath the Septizodium, the air had been stale and still, a stagnant miasma undisturbed for many years. The effect of their presence, initially, had stirred up the dust and decay of old Rome, clogging the air with tiny particles that caked the insides of their noses.
Da Capua had sneezed nearly constantly for several days before Colonna had offered to cut off the offending part of his face. He had then started to complain that the stench was eating at his soul—presumably, an item more difficult to remove. Since then, the ambient aroma of the tunnels had settled into a faint but unavoidable effluvium of sweat and charcoal.
But Colonna was correct. There was now a pungent scent of burning matter.
“It troubles me to agree with you, my dear Giovanni,” Capocci said. He fit a plug into the top of his clay jar, trapping the unhappy but harmless scorpions inside, and then stripped the leather glove off his hand. “I think we should go see if someone has set his beard on fire.”
“Oh,” Colonna raised his eyes toward the roof and clutched his hands theatrically to his chest, “please let it be Fieschi.”