you should suddenly need all
your faculties, they are yours at once. The drug is gone in an instant._

It was Saadi's teaching that whatever a man could accomplish with
drugs, he could accomplish more effectively and reliably with his mind
alone. A trained man could envision a drug that would serve any desired
purpose. And thus a man could transcend the Hashishiyya reliance on
administered drugs.

While he had drunk from the bowl of Soma and it had flooded through his
body, Daoud's fingers had gripped the little leather case hung around
his neck that contained the Sufi tawidh, the numerological invocation
that he believed would speed his healing. A river of blood had poured
out of his leg when Lorenzo drew out the arrow, and he had fainted.
Sophia had stitched the wound with cotton thread that was now black with
congealed blood.

Now Sophia laid a clean, folded linen cloth over the wound, used another
strip of linen to tie the poultice to his leg, and then pulled the
blanket up over him. Their eyes had not met once during the time she was
caring for him. He found to his surprise that he had to know what she
was thinking and feeling.

As if sensing his need, she spoke. "I have wanted to tell you, but you
were too sick to understand me. D'Ucello, the podesta, came here the
night of the uprising, looking for you and Lorenzo. As we planned, I
told him you had both gone to Perugia."

Daoud's body went cold. He felt as if he were being stalked, and the
hunter was closing in.

"Did he believe you?" he asked.

She shrugged. "He blustered some, but the cardinal ordered him off in
the end. I think he must have hoped to find you among the dead or
wounded at the Monaldeschi palace."

Daoud rolled over in bed, the wooden frame creaking, and the pain tore
through his leg like the slash of a scimitar. He groaned through
clenched teeth. Despite his ability to shield his mind from pain when it
took him unexpectedly like this, it could hurt like the torments of the
damned.

"What are you doing?"

He gasped. "Trying to get up. D'Ucello will be back, and he must not see
me wounded." He tried to sit up, and she laid her hand, firm and cool,
on his forehead and pushed him back against the pillows.

"You are in more danger from fever than you are from d'Ucello," she
said, letting her hand rest on his forehead.

"You will be surprised at how quickly the wound heals," he said,
touching the tawidh at his neck. "As for fever, it