When we struck camp that morning, we returned Berlik's skull to the leather bag and left the cooking-pot behind. It was a lucky thing we had a spare, since I wasn't sure I could have borne using it again. I laid it on its side, thinking that mayhap some woodland creature would someday use it for a nesting place. It was the sort of thing, I thought, that would have pleased Berlik. I didn't know how I knew that, but I did.

Maslin watched me with bemusement. "You're a very odd young man, Imriel de la Courcel."

"I've been accused of worse," I said.

He laughed. "True."

We rode in companionable silence that day. After the first few hours, the horses began pricking their ears and quickening their pace. They had a better sense of direction than I did, and like my long-bolted mount, Miroslas was the last warm stable they remembered. I kept an eye on the mountain-peak, but I gave my mount its head. When the shadows began to grow long, a suggestion of blue dusk arising beneath the trees, we took a chance and pushed onward a little longer.

We reached Mirsolas a bit before nightfall.

The sight of it was as unexpected as the first time, a hidden gem tucked away in the woods. Indeed, with the warm glow of lamplight shining from its windows, casting squares of yellow on the heavy snow, it looked more welcoming than I could have imagined.

"You're sure about this?" Maslin asked. He was shivering a little and his tone suggested he hoped very much that I was. It was late to retreat and make camp.

"I'm sure," I said.

We must have been spotted, for one of the silent brothers was there to receive us at the door. He looked to be Habiru, and he inclined his head when I greeted him in that tongue, although he made no reply.

At his gesture, Maslin and I stabled our grateful mounts, helping ourselves to feed and water. To my pleasure, I discovered that the horse I'd stolen in Tarkov had indeed returned safely as Maslin had said, though it looked shaggy and thin yet. There was another horse stabled there tonight, just as shaggy but well-fed. I was curious about it and wondered to whom it belonged. I didn't have the impression the priests here kept mounts for their own usage, nor that they had many visitors; at least not at this time of year.

"I've no idea," Maslin said crossly when I speculated aloud. "Elua! Does your mind never stop chewing over every last little question?"

I smiled. "Far more often than Phedre would like, believe me."

Inside, it wasn't long before we learned the answer, or at least a portion of it. We'd arrived at the regular dinner hour when all the brethren of Miroslas were served. The silent guide showed us to a chamber where we might leave our gear, then escorted us to the hall. There was no sign of the Rebbe, but the long tables that had been empty when I'd first dined there were filled with rows and rows of men of all ages, Vralian and Habiru alike. The only thing they shared in common were their sober black robes and their silence, although it was a charged silence, and our presence rendered it all the more so.

There was one fellow who was different. We were seated beside him at the end of one table. He wore some sort of soldier's livery; a heavy red tunic over black breeches and boots. There was a flared cross in black worked on the breast of his tunic, over his heart. He was hunched over a steaming bowl of meat dumplings, but he glanced up when we sat, his blue-grey eyes widening with an undefinable emotion.

"It is a sign," he murmured in Rus.

"Of what, my lord?" I asked quietly.

Our Habiru escort placed one finger against his lips and shook his head, motioning us to silence. His face looked troubled. I wondered why. Was it us or the rider?

Once Maslin and I had finished eating-which took a good long while, the dumplings were as good as I remembered and I was twice as ravenous-our escort rose and beckoned to us. We followed him. The soldier watched us go, his gaze unblinking.

Rebbe Avraham ben David was awaiting us in his private chamber. It was a spare, simple room. There was a cot, a rug on the floor and a fire in the hearth, with a trio of plain wooden chairs arrayed before it. There were no adornments. He rose when we entered. He looked older than he had ...when? Six weeks ago? Two months? I wasn't sure.

I bowed. "Shalom, Father."

Maslin bowed, too, but said nothing.

"Is it done?" the Rebbe asked me in Habiru.

"Yes." I faced him without flinching.

He sighed. "By both of you?"

"No," I said. "I was alone."

"Sit." The Rebbe pointed to the chairs. We sat. "How was it done?"

I glanced at Maslin. "My lord, is there any other tongue in which we might converse? One my companion might share?"

Rebbe Avraham smiled wryly. "I think not, child. I was a younger man in the Flatlands, and I speak the low tongue, Skaldic and Habiru, and I have learned Rus. Your companion was silent here before. Let him be silent now. How was it done?"

"As Berlik wished," I said. "I sent him to his gods."

"Ah." He was silent a moment. "I had hoped the solace he found in Yeshua's mercy might guide him."

"It did," I said. "It guided him to the center of his own heart. Father, Berlik cherished what he learned in Vralia. He kept Yeshua's cross on his wall to remind him. He said ..." I cleared my throat. "He hoped it was not importunate to consider a god a friend, and that if there was any god who would not mind, it was Yeshua ben Yosef, who is there for all the lost and broken people of the world. But Berlik was a leader of the Maghuin Dhonn, and a great magician. For the sake of his people, he made a bargain with their god to let his death pay the cost of their broken oath. And he believed it was answered." I paused. "If there is a kernel of truth to what his people believe, they are old, my lord. Very old. They speak of following their diadh-anam, the Brown Bear, from beyond Vralia to Alba when the world was covered in ice."

"And you believe this?" he asked.

"I believe what I have seen," I said. "I do not know what it means."

"I wish he had chosen otherwise. For Vralia's sake. For the sake of my people. We have need of men like him to shape the future of our faith. We are not all vowed to silence. Even in this quiet place, there were murmurs about him while he was here. There was such a depth to him, such a sorrow. Before he left, there were some here who began to speculate that he was one of the sainted ones, god-touched." He fixed me with a deep gaze. "And that a dark angel and a bright angel came to struggle for his soul."

I looked sideways at Maslin, his pale hair bright in the firelight.

"A fanciful tale." Rebbe Avraham snorted. "One can smell that you are mortal, and in need of a bath. Still, here you are." He looked thoughtful. "Which is which, I wonder?"

"Neither," I said. "Why did you send the Tarkovans after me?"

"I feared you were dead," he said. "They said you were a spy. I did not believe it, but I did not believe you should kill Berlik, either. Nor did I believe your silent companion sought your life. I hoped, somehow, it all might be averted. In the end, I consigned it to Adonai's will."

I sighed. "Well, then, it seems it was Adonai's will that two Tarkovan guards guilty of no crime save being too cursed stubborn and pig-headed to put down their swords and listen for one moment should die at my hand."

He bowed his head. "Dire news. I am sorry."

"You should be," I said. "You sent them."

"I bear responsibility for my choice, as you do for yours." Avraham ben David lifted his head. "If you had acknowledged the truth of your quest in Tarkov, they would not have believed you a spy and sought your life. Child, I am sorry, but I face larger choices than those which concern you. A great victory has been won in Yeshua's name."

"Fedor Vral?" I asked.

"The winter siege broke his followers' will," he said. "Lean and hungry, they opened the gates of Petrovik to Micah ben Ximon. Prince Fedor managed to flee beyond the mountains with a handful of Tatars, but his cause is all but lost. Ben Ximon did not even deem it worth the cost of pursuing him, not in winter. Thousands of his followers have deserted him." His old eyes were bright with strong emotion. "They are willing to acknowledge Yeshua as a portion of the terms of their surrender, and I do not know whether to rejoice or weep. Words spoken under duress do not suffice to change men's hearts. Grand Prince Tadeuz Vral sends a messenger asking me to come to Vralgrad to counsel him, and I do not know whether to stay or go."

I was silent, abashed.

While I had been engaged in my single-minded, solitary pursuit, a war had been waged and won. The fate of a nation had hung in the balance and shifted.

"Who is the Yeshua ben Yosef who holds sway in Vralia?" the Rebbe mused. "The friend who is there for the lost and lonely soul, or the warrior whose banner led Tadeuz Vral to this second victory? I do not know. And I am afraid."

"I understand," I said humbly. "I would help if I could."

"Perhaps you have." He drew a deep breath and gazed around the room. "You remind me that my choices affect lives. It is not enough to trust to Adonai's will. Our minds, our tongues, our hands are his tools. I will think on it, and pray." He nodded. "I thank you for coming to bring me this news yourself. Not all men would have done so."

"You cared for him," I said. "I wanted you to know that in the end, his death was peaceful. It wasn't what you wanted for him, but he was glad."

"And the Tarkovans?" the Rebbe asked. I didn't answer. His wise old gaze sharpened. "For the sake of the guilt we both bear, I'll make you a bargain, lad. Go to Tarkov to made amends. Tell them what befell their sons, brothers, and husbands. Tell them you have confessed it to me, and I have absolved you of all guilt and laid my blessing upon you, bidding you to spread the word among men that it is better to be filled with compassion than suspicion, and remind them that in the end, in Yeshua's kingdom, all men are brothers. That your coming is a sign all must be mindful of this, always and forever."

"Thus do we shape the world, Father?" I asked.

"Thus do we try," he said. "It should not strain your faith."

"No," I said. "Blessed Elua would not object."

"Blessed Elua," the Rebbe murmured, and shook his head. "You may go."

I rose, and Maslin rose with me, stifling a yawn. No doubt he'd been bored out of his wits, and him already half dead for lack of sleep. Together, we departed Avraham ben David's presence; the two of us, the bright and the dark.

Chapter Sixty-Three.

Our chamber was cold and the cots were hard. After the wilderness, it felt heavenly. Maslin and I didn't speak that night, only lay down and slept the sleep of the dead. By long force of habit, we woke before daybreak, and departed shortly thereafter.As before, no one bade us farewell. This time, though, quite a few turned out to watch us go, including Tadeuz Vral's messenger, his scarlet livery a bright splash of color against all the somber black robes. It was a strange feeling.

"So what's that all about?" Maslin asked me.

I told him what the messenger had said upon seeing us, that our presence was a sign. And I told him about my conversation with the Rebbe. Maslin smiled a little at the notion of the pair of us as bright and dark angels, but what he said surprised me.

"Mayhap our coming is a sign, Imriel. Who knows? The gods use mortals to their own purposes."

"A sign of what?" I asked. "The messenger didn't say."

"Well, the Rebbe certainly had his ideas on how to interpret it." He glanced sidelong at me. "Surely you're not going to do it, are you?"

"Go to Tarkov?" I thought about it. "Yes."

"Why?" Maslin stared at me in disbelief. "They might well throw you back in gaol, you know."

"I don't think so," I said. "Not with Rebbe Avraham's blessing on me." I thought about it more as we rode. "I withheld the truth to pursue my own quest. I could have waited for word from Micah ben Ximon. Elua, if I'd waited long enough, you'd have come, and you might have told a different tale." I grinned at him. "My bright angel come to save me. Mayhap the pair of us could have convinced them."

Maslin snorted. "Not likely."

I shrugged. "Well, it's on the way."

"For the spawn of a pair of traitors, you have a perversely stubborn sense of honor," he observed.

"My thanks," I said wryly.

We rode for a while without talking. "My father had a sense of honor," I said after a while. "Or so I'm told. It was just that it was misguided. That's how my mother was able to exploit him. He truly believed Terre d'Ange needed a pure-blooded D'Angeline heir."

Maslin shot me a look. "Do you?"

"Elua, no!" I dropped the reins to spread my arms. "Maslin, look at me. Do you think I'd be here, avenging my Cruithne wife, if that's what I held paramount?"

His lips twitched. "Not likely, no." His voice changed. "Do you ever wish you could have known him? Your father? Just to know what he was truly like ?"

I picked up the reins. "I saw him once."

"Your father?" He frowned. "I thought he died when you were a babe."

"He did." I told him about the Feast of the Dead and how I had seen the spirit of my father riding beside me, old and sad. Sadder than anyone I'd ever seen, even Berlik. How I'd hoped, then, that he had gained wisdom and come to bless his half-Cruithne grandson in the womb. How I'd wondered later if he had known what was to come, and grieved at it. Maslin listened as I talked, his lips parted in wonder.

"I'd like to see my father," he mused. "I wonder how he'd look at me."

"With pride, regret, and sorrow," I said. "Pride at what you've done. Regret at the fact he wasn't there to share it, never had a chance to acknowledge you as his child. Sorrow at the burden his legacy laid upon you.

Maslin shot me another look, wary. "You're serious?"

"I am," I said.

He fell silent for a time, his mouth a hard line. "Gods above, Imriel," he said at last in disgust. "You know, the last thing on earth I wanted was to like you."

I laughed.

"It's not funny!"

"It is," I said softly. "Ah, Maslin! There was a time when I wanted, so badly, for you to like me. You were older. You seemed so sure of yourself. And there was no one else I'd ever met who might understand, at least a little, what it was like to be a traitor's son. To struggle with that burden, to need to prove it to oneself, over and over. All I ever wanted was your friendship."

"Is that why you gave me Lombelon?" he asked.

"No." I shook my head. "No, that was different. I thought it was right, that's all. That it should belong to you. Phedre warned me that you might not be grateful. That you might come to hate me for it in the end."

"I did," Maslin said candidly.

"I noticed," I said.

We both laughed. Maslin grinned at me. "I'll always hate you a little bit."

"Only a little?" I asked.

"A bitter little husk of hatred," he said cheerfully. "Shoved into the deepest, narrowest corner of self-loathing in my heart, where I will continue to envy and despise you. For the fact that Ysandre de la Courcel searched the ends of the earth to acknowledge you as her kinsman, while my own paternity went unacknowledged and forgotten. For the fact that Phedre no Delaunay loved you enough to make you her foster-son, while I remained the gardener's daughter's bastard. For the fact that Joscelin Verreuil, the Queen's Champion, taught you to wield a sword while I was wielding pruning shears. For the fact that you rubbed these things in my face, whether or not you meant to. And, in the end, for the fact that Sidonie loves you and not me."

"Fair enough," I said. "What about the rest?"

"The rest of my heart?" Maslin asked.

I nodded.

He leaned over in the saddle and took my shoulder in a hard grip; one that lay somewhere between affection and violence. "I've a feeling I missed an opportunity somewhere. I'd count you a friend if you'd still have me."