tle yesterday and lose
their lives?"

Charles's eyes narrowed. "I know what grief you must feel, having
guarded them so carefully for so long. But they insisted. They had
fought against Christians. So now they wanted to see how a battle looks
from our side. They knew the risks. They had been warriors all their
lives. They were my guests, and I had to let them do what they wanted."

Simon looked out at the valley. The line of men carrying rocks to
Manfred's cairn stretched far into the distance, disappearing finally
beyond the crests of rolling fields. The line still looked as long as
ever. It wound past a long, narrow mound of freshly turned brown
earth--the mass grave dug at dawn by prisoners for the dead of Manfred's
army. The man called Daoud--Simon still thought of him as David--who for
more than two years had fought Simon relentlessly, lay somewhere under
that mound of earth. The man Sophia had loved.

Near at hand the soldiers who had added their rocks to the pile were
dismantling Manfred's camp. Tents collapsed in flurries of colored
cloth.

_All these fighting men. And King Louis could have added twice as many
to these. What could they not have accomplished if they had invaded
Palestine at the same time a Tartar army struck at the Saracens from the
east?_

He decided to probe further. "Now there can be no planning for a
crusade--until the next ambassadors come from Tartary. Is that your
wish?"

Charles smiled. "Oh, eventually we will want to make war on the
Saracens. After Italy is united, after the Byzantine Empire is ours once
more. Toward that day, we want to maintain the bonds of friendship with
the Tartars. If they send us more ambassadors, we will treat them
royally and shower them with fair words."

"And send them home with nothing," Simon added.

"For now," Charles agreed. "For now, instead of planning war with Egypt,
I believe it is more in my interest to do as the Hohenstaufens did when
they ruled Sicily--cultivate friendly relations with the Sultan of
Cairo."

Simon was silent for a moment, amazed that Anjou could be so open about
his lack of principle. He felt his face grow hot and his voice quiver as
his anger forced its way to the surface.

"Everything you have done and said has been for one purpose only, to
make yourself king of Sicily. I guessed as much, and now I know. And
that is why I do not want a dukedom in your kingdom. Because I do not
want to be used by you anymore."

Char