m, and he helped her up.
She saw that he had a bloodstained strip of linen tied around his neck.

"The balcony," she said.

"Good."

As she went to her chest to get her cloak, Sophia looked at the icon of
the saint of the pillar and thought how much, even though it had Simon's
name, the expression looked like Daoud's.

Simon held the door to the balcony for her. The night was cold and
moonless. The bitter smell of burning floated on the freezing air. The
shouts of frenzied soldiers and the agonized screams of men and women
seemed to come from everywhere. Fires blazed in all parts of the town,
their glow and smoke turning the night sky a cloudy reddish-gray. On the
plain to the north, campfires twinkled. Somewhere out there Daoud lay
dead.

She looked up at Simon. Darkness hid his face. The ruddy glow of burning
Benevento haloed his head. In a quiet, even voice he told Sophia how he
came upon Daoud fighting side by side with Manfred, and how he fought
with Daoud after Manfred was killed. How he lay helpless with Daoud's
sword pointed at his face.

"He did not move for a long time," Simon said. "It was growing dark, but
I saw the look on his face. A gentle look. He did not want to kill me. I
am sure of it."

And then without any warning had come the treacherous crossbow bolt out
of the circle around them, and Daoud had fallen.

"It was Sordello. He could not understand my rage at him. He kept
protesting that he had saved my life. He had not."

Sophia thought of Sordello's attempt to seduce her. She clutched the
wooden railing, choking bile rising in her throat.

"I am glad I killed him," she whispered. "I have never killed anyone
before tonight. That I killed him was a gift from God."

Simon did not answer at once.

Then he said, "Tonight, before Daoud died, he told me that you were
innocently drawn into his conspiracy against the alliance. He said he
took advantage of my love for you, and that you and he were never close.
But now that you've heard he is dead, you are like a woman who has lost
a husband or a lover."

He stopped. He needed to say no more. She knew what he was asking.

The enormous aching void inside her made it almost impossible to think.
Daoud, even as he lay dying, had tried to protect her. Simon might have
suspicions, but about who she was or what she had done, he knew nothing.
Manfred was dead. Tilia, Ugolini and Lorenzo--wherever they might be
now--would say nothing.

She could, if