ntil they hurt and the fire in his
eyes terrified her. But she held her face frozen, refusing to show fear
or pain.

"Say no more," he whispered in a strangled voice. "Not another word."

_Saint Simon, protect me._

_Simon._

She could see the struggle in David's face and body. She had enraged him
to the point where he wanted to hurt her. But he was not going to let
himself do it. She thought she must have taken a hundred breaths before
he released his grip on her shoulders, pushing her away a little.

Again she wondered what he had been through that would give him such
iron self-control. She stood looking at him, breathing heavily in the
aftermath of her terror.

_I am a fool to despise anything as powerful as what he has._

He raked her with his eyes, then turned toward the door.

"Do not bother to find out about Rachel for me," she said. "I will go
myself."

He stopped, and the fury in his face made her brace herself again for an
attack.

"You cannot go. You cannot be seen going into Tilia's."

"Do you think I have served great men for years without learning how to
move about a city unnoticed?"

"Go, then." His normally fair face was scarlet with rage. "And learn
from Rachel's own lips what the Tartar did to her."

For a moment she seemed to go blind and deaf. She felt hot and cold at
once. Her body had reacted to the meaning of his words before her brain
understood them.

"_Tartar!_ The man was a Tartar? You let a Tartar have her?" Sophia
seized the first object near her hand and threw it at him. She saw as it
struck him that it was the painted skull. It hit his chest with a thump,
and he took a step backward.

"You filthy bastard!" she screamed. "Pig of a Turk!"

Expressionless, he turned without another word and left her, closing the
door of Ugolini's cabinet behind him.

She sank weeping to the floor.

_Rachel, Rachel, how could they do this to you? With a Tartar. Oh, no!_

She sat there until her tears stopped and her thoughts began to make
some sense. The skull, lying on its side, seemed to look back at her.

_Thank you, David. You have made my decision for me. Simon de Gobignon
shall have me._

XXIX

This was a fearsome place, thought Daoud as he gazed around the
underground chamber hewn out of the yellow tufa on which the building
stood. Lit with torches, its vault was festooned with ropes and chains,
one wall lined with whips, rods, and scourges hanging from hooks, pokers